Intuitive Machines partners with Houston college for workforce training

space training

Intuitive Machines, Rhodium Scientific and San Jacinto College will partner to train future workers for space-based pharma recovery. Photo courtesy Intuitive Machines.

Intuitive Machines, a Houston-based space technology, infrastructure and services company, has forged a partnership with San Jacinto College to develop a program for training workers to handle biopharmaceutical materials delivered to Earth on Intuitive Machines’ re-entry vehicle.

Intuitive Machines is working with biotech company Rhodium Scientific on the project. Rhodium, also based in Houston, is developing biomanufacturing payloads for Intuitive Machines’ re-entry vehicle.

“Delivering life-improving pharmaceuticals from orbit is only valuable with reliable recovery and processes on Earth,” Tim Crain, chief technology officer at Intuitive Machines, said in a news release. “That requires more than a spacecraft — it demands the workforce, facilities, and regulatory alignment to support safe, repeatable operations. San Jacinto College has the credibility and technical depth to make this vision a reality.”

San Jacinto College provides training certified by the National Institute for Bioprocessing Research and Training. Christopher Wild, assistant vice chancellor and vice president of biotechnology at San Jacinto College, said that with this certification and the college’s presence at Houston Spaceport, the school “is uniquely positioned to train the workforce needed (for) commercial space-based pharma recovery.”

The first-phase grant supporting Intuitive Machines’ Earth re-entry program will culminate in a full-scale mockup tailored to real payloads and use cases in early 2026.

Intuitive Machines said the collaborations with San Jacinto College and Rhodium “aim to align future landing infrastructure, research opportunities, and funding pathways that deliver lasting economic impact from space.”

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March Biosciences' oversubscribed raise brought in $28.4 million of financing with Mission BioCapital and 4BIO Capital leading the pack of investors. Photo via Getty Images

Clinical-stage Houston cell therapy company closes $28.4M oversubscribed series A

cha-ching

An emerging biotech company in Houston has closed its series A with outsized success.

March Biosciences' oversubscribed raise brought in $28.4 million of financing with Mission BioCapital and 4BIO Capital leading the pack of investors. The company has now raised more than $51 million in total.

Last year, March Biosciences announced its strategic alliance with CTMC (Cell Therapy Manufacturing Center), a joint venture between MD Anderson Cancer Center and National Resilience. CEO Sarah Hein met her co-founder, Max Mamonkin, at the TMC Accelerator for Cancer Therapeutics. Along with fellow co-founder Malcolm Brenner, March Biosciences launched from the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy (Baylor College of Medicine, Houston Methodist Hospital and Texas Children’s Hospital). Its goal is to fight cancers that have been unresponsive to existing immunotherapies using its lead asset, MB-105.

An autologous CD5-targeted CAR-T cell therapy, MB-105 is currently in phase-1 trials in patients with refractory T-cell lymphoma and leukemia. The treatment is showing signs of being both safe and effective, meriting a phase-2 trial that will begin early next year. The funds raised from the series A will help to finance the Phase 2 clinical development of MB-105 to expand on the existing data with optimized manufacturing processes.

“This oversubscribed financing enables us to advance our first-in-class CAR-T therapy, MB-105, into a Phase 2 trial for T-cell lymphoma – an indication with an exceptionally poor prognosis and few treatment options,” says Hein. “With the support and confidence of our investors, we are not only advancing our lead program but also expanding our pipeline, underscoring our commitment to delivering best-in-class therapies to patients that can change the treatment paradigm for these challenging cancers.”

But that’s not the only exciting news that Hein and her associates have to report. March Biosciences has recently partnered with cell therapy venture studio, Volnay Therapeutics. Led by highly experienced cell therapy development veterans, the March Biosciences team will work to develop a scalable manufacturing process for MB-105 that will lead to commercialization. Volnay co-founder and CEO Stefan Wildt, who held key R&D leadership positions in cell and gene therapy units at Novartis and Takeda, has also joined the board of March Biosciences. The board of directors is also welcoming Cassidy Blundell of Mission BioCapital and Owen Smith of 4BIO Capital.

“The team at March Biosciences is leveraging powerful science and promising clinical data to tackle cancers with significant unmet need,” says Blundell, a partner at Mission BioCapital. “We're excited to support their journey and believe their focused approach with MB-105 could lead to significant breakthroughs in the CAR-T space.”

The Houston-born company, which is a finalist for the 2024 Houston Innovation Awards, continues to accelerate quickly, in part thanks to its home base. After all, existing local investors like TMC Venture Fund also participated in the new raise. As Hein said last year, “Working with partners here in Houston, we have all the pieces and the community rises to the occasion to support you.”

CellChorus created a visualization AI program that helps scientists to better understand the functioning of cells, including their activation, killing and movement. Photo via Getty Images

Houston health tech startup scores $2.5M SBIR grant to advance unique cell therapy AI technology

fresh funding

A Houston biotech company just announced a new award of $2.5 million.

CellChorus, a spinoff of the Single Cell Lab at the University of Houston, announced the fresh funding, which comes from an SBIR (Small Business Innovation Research) grant from the National Institute of Health (NIH) through its National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS).

CellChorus is the business behind a technology called TIMING, which stands for Time-lapse Imaging Microscopy In Nanowell Grids. It’s a visualization AI program that helps scientists to better understand the functioning of cells, including their activation, killing and movement. This more in-depth knowledge of immune cells could be instrumental in developing novel therapies in countless disorders, including cancers and infectious diseases.

“While many cell therapies have been approved and are in development, the industry needs an integrated analytical platform that provides a matrix of functional readouts, including cell phenotype and metabolism on the same cells over time,” Rebecca Berdeaux, vice president of science at CellChorus, says in a press release. “We are grateful to NCATS for its support of the development of application-specific kits that apply dynamic, functional single-cell analysis of immune cell phenotype and function. The product we will develop will increase the impact of these therapies to improve the lives of patients.”

A two-year, $2.1 million Phase II grant will begin after the company achieves predetermined milestones under a $350,000 Phase I grant that is currently taking place. As Berdeaux explained, the funds will be used to develop TIMING kits which will manufacture analytics that provide end-users with rapid, specific and predictive results to accelerate translational research and the development and manufacture of more effective cell therapies.

TIMING is more than a great idea whose time has yet to come. It has already been proven in great depth. In fact, last June, CellChorus CEO Daniel Meyer told InnovationMap that he was initially attracted to the technology because it was “very well validated.” At the time, CellChorus had just announced a $2.3 million SBIR Fast-Track grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences. The company also went on to win an award in the Life Science category of the 2023 Houston Innovation Awards.

That confirmation of success comes from more than 200 peer-reviewed papers that describe myriad cell types and types of therapy, all of which used data from TIMING assays. TIMING data has benefited industry leaders in everything from research and clinical development to manufacturing. With the new grant, TIMING will become more widely available to scientists making important discoveries relating to the inner workings of the cells that drive our immunity.

OncoResponse in partnership with MD Anderson Cancer Center received a portion of $73 million the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas has doled out this spring. Photo via oncoresponse.com

Seattle biotech co. to move to Houston thanks to $13.3M grant from Texas organization

CPRIT funding spotted

A biotech company has landed a more than $13 million grant from the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas.

The nearly $13.3 million grant given to OncoResponse — which is relocating from Seattle to Houston, according to CPRIT's news release — will help the company develop fully human monoclonal antibodies for treatment of cancer that otherwise would not respond to immunotherapy. OncoResponse already has a partnership with MD Anderson Cancer Center, which is one of the company’s investors.

“We are thrilled to receive this recognition from CPRIT in supporting the potential of our immunotherapy candidate OR502. We greatly appreciate the additional support from our investors as we continue to make significant progress with our drug development efforts advancing immunotherapies derived from clues of Elite Responders,” says Clifford Stocks, CEO of OncoResponse, in a news release.

Aside from the grant, OncoResponse just hauled in $14 million from existing investors in a round led by RiverVest Venture Partners. Other participants in the series D round include Venture Partners, Canaan Partners, 3B Future Health Fund, Bering Capital, Takeda Ventures, and InterVest Capital Partners.

To date, OncoResponse has raised more than $180 million, according to market research company CB Insights.

A representative of OncoResponse couldn’t be reached for comment about the company’s relocation to Houston.

MD Anderson and Seattle-based Theraclone Sciences launched OncoResponse in 2015. Rice University was among the inaugural investors.

OncoResponse’s OR2805 immunotherapy product is being evaluated in a Phase 1 clinical trial. It’s the company’s leading immunotherapy candidate. OncoResponse is also working on OR502, an antibody being prepared for investigational and clinical studies.

“The modern treatment of cancer activates the body’s own immune system to attack cancer,” OncoResponse says in a summary posted on the website of the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT).

“These treatments, called immunotherapy, may not be successful if the cancer can recruit bad-acting cells, such as tumor associated macrophages, or TAMs, that create barriers preventing immunotherapies from activating the body’s own defenses against the cancer. To find drugs that may help counteract these TAMs, OncoResponse looked to patients who had responded very well to immunotherapy to see if their bodies made factors to block TAMs and helped them fight their cancers.”

OncoResponse’s OR502 prevents TAMs from shutting down the body’s response to cancer, thus restoring tumor-killing immune activity, CPRIT explains.

In addition to OncoResponse, recent CPRIT grant recipients from the Houston area are:

  • Houston-based 7 Hills Pharma, $13,439,001. The company is working on immunotherapies for treatment of cancer and prevention of infectious diseases.
  • Houston-based Allterum Therapeutics, $11,721,150. The company is coming up with an antibody for treatment of patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. This type of cancer affects blood and bone marrow.
  • Houston-based Cell Therapy Manufacturing Center, $9.1 million. The center is a joint venture between National Resilience and MD Anderson Cancer Center that is developing cell therapy manufacturing technologies to support biotech partnerships.
  • Houston-based Pulmotect, $8,851,165. The company’s PUL-042 product is aimed at treating and preventing respiratory complications in cancer patients.
  • Cancer researcher Michael King, $6 million. The grant helped lure King to Rice from Nashville’s Vanderbilt University, where he’s been the chair of biomedical engineering. King’s lab at Vanderbilt has been testing therapies for metastatic breast cancer and prostate cancer.
  • Missouri City-based OmniNano Pharmaceuticals, $2,711,437. The pharmatech company is working on two drugs for treatment of solid tumors in patients with pancreatic cancer.

“Texas is unique because of CPRIT’s ability to invest in cutting-edge research when private capital is scarce. This is yet another way Texas is leading the nation in the fight against cancer,” Wayne Roberts, CEO of CPRIT, says in a news release.

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6 exciting Houston startup raises to know from July 2026

fresh funding

Houston startups carried the fundraising momentum of Q1 and Q2 into July with several significant seed funding, Series A and Series B rounds.

From geothermal leaders to medtech innovators, these six Houston companies raised more than a quarter billion dollars last month alone, according to reporting by InnovationMap and our sister site, EnergyCapitalHTX.com.

Did we miss a funding round? Let us know by emailing innoeditor@innovationmap.com.

Altillion

Houston-based startup Altillion has secured $5 million in seed funding to accelerate the commercialization of its proprietary IRIS and ALIX technologies, which convert oilfield-produced water into valuable minerals, the company reported earlier this month.

San Francisco-based EIC Rose Rock and Houston-based Flathead Forge led the round. Altillion says the funding will go toward pilot facilities and commercial deployments as the company looks to scale in the U.S. Continue reading.

Buildforce

The U.S. is grappling with a current shortage of 50,000 electricians, according to the National Electrical Contractors Association. Photo via Unsplash

Houston-based Buildforce, which provides a tech-enabled staff platform geared toward electricians and electrical contractors, closed a $10 million Series A round led by Houston’s Saepio Capital last month.

Other investors in the round include Blue Heron Capital, Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, S3 Ventures and Chicago Ventures.

Buildforce says the funding will help fuel its national expansion and further development of its technology.

The startup, founded in 2019, connects electricians with electrical contractors for commercial and industrial construction projects. Continue reading.

Hephae Energy Technology Corp.

The company develops ultra-high-temperature tools to withstand the heat of geothermal reservoirs. Photo via hephaeet.com

Houston-area startup Hephae Energy Technology Corp. closed a $17.8 million Series A financing round last month to commercialize its geothermal technology.

The round was co-led by Pennsylvania-based Susquehanna Sustainable Investments, which invests in early-stage climatech companies, and Copenhagen-based Underground Ventures, which focuses on geothermal energy startups. Alfa8, Baruch Future Ventures, Centaurus Capital LP, Elemental Impact, Exa Ventures, Future Ventures, Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment, New System Ventures and True North Institute joined the round, along with existing Houston-based investor Nabors Industries. Hephae reports in a news release that the Series A round brings the company's total capital raised to $24.7 million. Continue reading.

TYBR Health

The company's B3 GEL System is designed to protect tendons, ligaments and muscles while they heal from orthopedic surgery. Photo via Unsplash

Houston-based healthtech startup TYBR Health has raised a $30 million Series A round to scale its B3 GEL System, which helps protect tendons from scarring after surgery, the company announced last month.

The round was led by Minneapolis-based Vensana Capital and Cleveland-based Mutual Capital Partners, with participation from Denver-based Neovate Capital Partners and existing investors, according to a news release from the company.

TYBR Health said it plans to use the funding to broaden the B3 GEL System's clinical applications, expand commercialization and conduct studies to evaluate its ability to protect tissue and improve healing outcomes. Continue reading.

Venus Aerospace 

Venus Aerospace has secured funding from Mercury Fund, Lockheed Martin Ventures and others. Photo courtesy Venus Aerospace

Houston-based Venus Aerospace closed a $91 million Series B round last month and plans to scale the production of its hypersonic engine.

The round was led by Houston-based Mercury Fund with participation from Lockheed Martin Ventures, MESH, PEAK6, Draper Associates, Starboard Star Venture Capital, Green Sands Equity and other investors, according to a news release.

The investment comes about a year after Venus completed the first U.S. flight test of its high-thrust rotating detonation rocket engine (RDRE). The engine is expected to enable vehicles to travel four to six times the speed of sound from a conventional runway and is about 15 percent more efficient than traditional alternatives, according to the company. Continue reading.

Quaise Energy

A rendering of a Quaise Energy geothermal plant. Rendering via quaise.com

Houston-based Quaise Energy, a producer of utility-scale geothermal power, closed $134 million in a Series B round last month to advance its “superhot” geothermal power plant.

Climate-focused San Francisco-based investment firm Prelude Ventures led the round, with participation from JERA Co., Japan’s largest power generation company, and Idemitsu Kosan, one of Japan’s largest energy companies. Nearly all existing investors, including cleantech-focused investment firm Safar Partners, participated in the round.

The startup expects more equity and debt deals to close “imminently.” Quaise has raised $230 million since its founding in 2018. Continue reading.

Houston researchers develop dissolvable implant for targeted cancer drug delivery

cancer research

Researchers at Houston Methodist have developed a biodegradable implant that can be used to safely and consistently deliver drug treatments to tumors and then dissolve without the need for further surgery.

The implant is only the size of a grain of rice, but its potential is staggering. The biodegradable nanofibrous drug-eluting seed (b-NDES) works as a reservoir parked inside a soft tumor, where it can slowly release immune-stimulating drugs over time. This overcomes a consistent problem with drugs such as immune checkpoint inhibitors. Normal systemic administration sees comparatively little of the drug making its way to the tumor, with most of it circulating throughout the body. The b-NDES is like deploying a small guerrilla fighting force embedded in enemy territory, doing maximum damage to the entrenched tumor.

"To improve cancer treatment, we're trying to start a fire inside the tumor itself," Corrine Chua, associate professor in the Center for BioNanoengineering at Houston Methodist Research Institute, said in a news release. "By activating immune cells directly within the tumor microenvironment, those cells can then travel throughout the body and seek out cancer wherever it exists. The b-NDES platform was developed to help keep therapeutic drugs concentrated inside tumors while minimizing exposure to healthy tissues.”

Chua co-led the study with Alessandro Grattoni, chair and director of the Center for BioNanoengineering at Houston Methodist Research Institute.

The study included support from the Nancy Owens Breast Cancer Foundation and the National Institutes of Health/National Cancer Institute.

Chau and Grattoni used preclinical models of triple-negative breast cancer, an aggressive form of cancer that is estrogen receptor-negative, progesterone receptor-negative and HER2-negative. Because of the receptor negativity, some popular treatments like tamoxifen and trastuzumab are ineffective. Chemotherapy has been shown to be the best course of action.

The b-NDES implant is deployed alongside radiation drugs. It keeps the drugs focused on the tumor, reducing the amount of harmful side effects typically seen when drugs are circulated more widely in the body. In 60 percent of the models, tumors were eliminated and did not cause side effects beyond the tumor site. Once the drugs have been deployed, the implant breaks down naturally.

While promising, more research will have to be done to expand use to other tumor types.

"Although the study focused on triple-negative breast cancer models, the approach could have broader applications for solid tumors," Grattoni added in the release. "It could potentially be used in cancers where there is a tumor lesion accessible for placement, including pancreatic or lung cancers."

New Houston platform Same Day Reels launches for on-demand content creation

In The Moment

If an event doesn't happen on Instagram, did it even really happen? In today's social media-driven age of branding and audience engagement, the answer increasingly is no.

Houston entrepreneur Karen De Amat is looking to fill the online content creation needs of companies with her new venture, Same Day Reels, which launched in early August. It will serve as a platform to connect companies and brands with talent that can help turn an event into a viral moment as it is happening.

"Events move quickly, and social media moves even faster,” said De Amat. “Same Day Reels was built to help brands capture the moment while it still matters. We are creating a more efficient way for businesses and creators to work together. Brands need content faster, and creators need more opportunities to turn their talent into real work. Same Day Reels brings those needs together.”

The company is focused on adding livestreams and concurrent short video content to "activations, launches, fundraisers, grand openings, conferences, hospitality experiences, and private celebrations." Such content can significantly increase the visibility of a product or brand according to digital marketing brands like Wyzowl, whose data found 63 percent of people in 2026 prefer to learn about new products via short video.

Packages offered by Same Day Reels will include filming, editing, and publishing content within hours of the targeted event.

De Amat says that her content creation platform will be a way to preserve the excitement of events and launches by enshrining them with immediate social media-driven memories.

“Event content is no longer just something you post after the fact,” De Amat said. “It is part of how people experience, remember and share the moment.”

Previously, De Amat is also the founder and CEO of Social Behavior, an influencer marketing company she launched from her home in 2014. It quickly garnered an array of clients and thrust De Amat into the spotlight, including numerous appearances on Fox 26's The Isiah Factor. Influencer Marketing Hub named her one of the top CEOs of influencer marketing companies in Houston in 2025.

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This article originally appeared on CultureMap.com.

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