City of Houston opens applications for 2023 business competition

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Small businesses in Houston can apply for the annual Liftoff Houston competition. Photo via liftoffhouston.smapply.org

The City of Houston opened applications for its annual Liftoff Houston Startup Business Plan Competition, which helps local founders bring their months-old companies to new heights.

Now in its 11th year, the competition and educational program awards $10,000 in seed money to three founders after completing a four-month-long workshop series that culminates in a Pitch Day. Winners are named in three categories: Innovation, Product and Service.

Applications must be received by 4 p.m. on Friday, August 4. And Pitch Day will be held on November 18. To be eligible for the competition, applicants must live in Houston and operate their businesses here. Businesses must have only been in operation for less than a year and show verifiable revenue that does not exceed $10,000. Founders who do not meet these criteria are eligible for Liftoff's Educational Pathway track that does not include the competition portion of the program.

“For 11 years, Liftoff Houston has empowered participants to achieve financial mobility through entrepreneurship,” Mayor Sylvester Turner said in a statement. “These participants have become key drivers to the success of Houston’s economy, and they have contributed to our communities by creating jobs and by providing much needed goods and services.”

Liftoff Houston is sponsored by Capital One Bank and administered by the Houston Public Library and the City's Office of Business Opportunity. According to a statement, the program has helped serve historically marginalized populations in Houston. In last year's cohort, 95 of participants identified as people of color, 77 percent were female, 44 percent had no college degree and 54 percent made less than $50,000.

Last year's winners in the Innovation, Product and Service were:

  • Innovation: Aditya Aggarwal, founder of Maritime XR, which aims to supplement conventional maritime training with virtual reality simulations.
  • Product: Hannah Le, founder of RE.STATEMENT, a marketplace for designers to upcycle old fashion into wearable art
  • Service: Natasha Roberts, founder of ActIVate Drip Spa, which provides medical-grade IV drips that help eliminate toxins and aid hydration and recovery

"I wanted to see how far I could go," Le told Innovation Map earlier this year. "I had pitched before, but this was the first time that I was onstage and I just felt like I belonged there."

Le shared more about the founding of RE.STATEMENT and how Liftoff Houston impacted her business in an episode of the Houston Innovators Podcast




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Texans see need for telemedicine amid the pandemic, Liftoff Houston has launched applications, ChipMonk Bakery is growing, and more of the latest Houston innovation news. Getty Images

Startups raise funds, Houston biz contest opens apps, and more innovation news

Short stories

From health-conscious cookies reaching fundraising goals to a Houston-wide business competition, the Bayou City's innovation news is pretty diverse.

In InnovationMap's latest roundup of startup and tech short stories, there's everything from telemedicine, fundraising, and more.

Houston baking startup raises money after finding its new home

ChipMonk Baking Company, a consumer packaged goods startup focused on healthy dessert options, has met its goal of $150,000. Photo courtesy of ChipMonk

Houston-based ChipMonk Baking Company, which recently found a new home in a new dedicated production facility, has reached its goal on its investment round on NextSeed.

ChipMonk, which was founded last year to create sweets that use sweeteners monk fruit and allulose for health-conscious consumers, will soon operate in a 2,300-square-foot space at 3042 Antoine Dr. The space is strictly for baking, storage, etc. and will not have a storefront.

Co-founders Jose Hernandez and David Downing have seen a spike in demand since the start of the pandemic, which increased the need to upgrade from shared kitchen space.

"The stay-at-home environment has encouraged many people to think more about their health and to start cooking and baking more at home. We've been able to offer a delicious option that fits perfectly in this growing trend," says Downing, who also serves as CEO.

ChipMonk's lease begins next month, and, to fund its growth plans, the company launched a its campaign on NextSeed. In just a couple weeks, the startup met its fundraising goal of $150,000.

Cancer nonprofit moves into new space

The Rose has a new facility to better serve patients. Photos courtesy of The Rose

The Rose, a Houston-based breast cancer nonprofit that provides medical services to 40,000 patients annually, has moved into its new space at 6575 West Loop South, suite 275, in May.

"We know this location will allow us to better serve our community," says Dorothy Gibbons, co-founder and CEO of The Rose, in a news release. "During this time of the pandemic, we've added so many safety precautions and will continue to space appointments to allow social distancing. Most of all we want our patients to feel safe and welcome from the moment they walk through our door."

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, data reports have shown a drop in routine health care, like cervical and breast cancer screenings. Gibbons says the drop in these appointments is concerning and those who postpone routine screening or diagnostic testing could be at risk for developing later stage breast cancer.

"Our message to our patients is breast cancer is not going to wait until this pandemic is over; neither should you. With the projected increase in uninsured women, due to so many job losses, The Rose has to be ready to serve. Now more than ever, we depend on our insured patients to help cover the care for uninsured patients," she says.

Houston business competition opens applications

Small businesses in Houston have until August 10 to apply for the annual Liftoff Houston competition. Photo via liftoffhouston.smapply.org

The city of houston's annual business plan competition, Liftoff Houston, has opened applications. The program, which is sponsored by Capital One Bank, is looking for companies and will award winners in three categories: Product, service, and innovation

Each business that wins will receive a $10,000 cash prize. The competition is focused on early stage startups with revenue less than $10,000 and must have only been in business for less than a year. The companies also must be based in Houston.

Applicants can submit their information online to be considered for the contest. The deadline to apply is August 10.

TMCx company closes $1.53 million seed round

Manatee

Manatee has raised funds for its digital therapy platform. Photo via getmanatee.com

Manatee, a health tech startup based in Denver that was a member of this year's TMCx cohort, has announced it closed its seed funding round at $1.53 million. The company, which provides digital solutions to therapy for children, closed the round at the end of June.

Michigan-based Grand Ventures led the raise and invested alongside The American Family Insurance Institute (AmFam), Telosity, SpringTime Ventures, and notable health care entrepreneurs, Danish Munir, Luke Leninger, and Johnathan Weiner, according to information emailed by Manatee representative.

"Manatee was the first solution we found that really understood kids and their unique needs," says Christopher Neuharth, executive director of digital health and experience at Children's Wisconsin. "They got the dynamics between the child, parent, and therapist – and how to influence behavior change."

Accenture study finds COVID-19 has been a gamechanger for telemedicine

Houston medical organizations pivot to telemedicine and remote care amid COVID-19 crisis

An Accenture study found that most Texans are seeking telehealth amid the pandemic. Getty Images

According to a recent study from Accenture, 89 percent of Texas consumers want telehealth options — and the COVID-19 pandemic deserves the credit for the increased interest.

According to a press release from the company, the research found that:

  • One-fourth of Texans surveyed said they first learned about virtual health care following the outbreak of COVID-19.
  • The number of Texans who said they know a little or a lot about virtual health care increased 25 percent following the outbreak.
  • Approximately nine in 10 Texans surveyed after the pandemic began believe that virtual care options should be available to everyone.

The widespread stay-at-home orders exposed Texans to virtual health care and left a positive impression on receiving care remotely. For instance:

  • An estimated 4.5 million state residents began using virtual health care services since the onset of the pandemic.
  • Nearly half (45 percent) of Texans said they trust a virtual health visit as much as or more than an in-person visit—a 15 percent uptick from the pre-pandemic period.
  • Six out of seven remote-care patients (86 percent) who have continued to use virtual care options during the pandemic said their experience after the start of the COVID-19 outbreak was better or the same as before, and three-quarters (76 percent) said their wait time was shorter or the same.

"A lot of Texans got a taste for what it's like to see their physicians and specialists from the safety and comfort of their home," says Mark Olney, a managing director in Accenture's health practice and the study's lead author. "Now patients are eager to get more of that access, convenience and time savings."

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Elon Musk vows to launch solar-powered data centers in space

To Outer Space

Elon Musk vowed this week to upend another industry just as he did with cars and rockets — and once again he's taking on long odds.

The world's richest man said he wants to put as many as a million satellites into orbit to form vast, solar-powered data centers in space — a move to allow expanded use of artificial intelligence and chatbots without triggering blackouts and sending utility bills soaring.

To finance that effort, Musk combined SpaceX with his AI business on Monday, February 2, and plans a big initial public offering of the combined company.

“Space-based AI is obviously the only way to scale,” Musk wrote on SpaceX’s website, adding about his solar ambitions, “It’s always sunny in space!”

But scientists and industry experts say even Musk — who outsmarted Detroit to turn Tesla into the world’s most valuable automaker — faces formidable technical, financial and environmental obstacles.

Feeling the heat

Capturing the sun’s energy from space to run chatbots and other AI tools would ease pressure on power grids and cut demand for sprawling computing warehouses that are consuming farms and forests and vast amounts of water to cool.

But space presents its own set of problems.

Data centers generate enormous heat. Space seems to offer a solution because it is cold. But it is also a vacuum, trapping heat inside objects in the same way that a Thermos keeps coffee hot using double walls with no air between them.

“An uncooled computer chip in space would overheat and melt much faster than one on Earth,” said Josep Jornet, a computer and electrical engineering professor at Northeastern University.

One fix is to build giant radiator panels that glow in infrared light to push the heat “out into the dark void,” says Jornet, noting that the technology has worked on a small scale, including on the International Space Station. But for Musk's data centers, he says, it would require an array of “massive, fragile structures that have never been built before.”

Floating debris

Then there is space junk.

A single malfunctioning satellite breaking down or losing orbit could trigger a cascade of collisions, potentially disrupting emergency communications, weather forecasting and other services.

Musk noted in a recent regulatory filing that he has had only one “low-velocity debris generating event" in seven years running Starlink, his satellite communications network. Starlink has operated about 10,000 satellites — but that's a fraction of the million or so he now plans to put in space.

“We could reach a tipping point where the chance of collision is going to be too great," said University at Buffalo's John Crassidis, a former NASA engineer. “And these objects are going fast -- 17,500 miles per hour. There could be very violent collisions."

No repair crews

Even without collisions, satellites fail, chips degrade, parts break.

Special GPU graphics chips used by AI companies, for instance, can become damaged and need to be replaced.

“On Earth, what you would do is send someone down to the data center," said Baiju Bhatt, CEO of Aetherflux, a space-based solar energy company. "You replace the server, you replace the GPU, you’d do some surgery on that thing and you’d slide it back in.”

But no such repair crew exists in orbit, and those GPUs in space could get damaged due to their exposure to high-energy particles from the sun.

Bhatt says one workaround is to overprovision the satellite with extra chips to replace the ones that fail. But that’s an expensive proposition given they are likely to cost tens of thousands of dollars each, and current Starlink satellites only have a lifespan of about five years.

Competition — and leverage

Musk is not alone trying to solve these problems.

A company in Redmond, Washington, called Starcloud, launched a satellite in November carrying a single Nvidia-made AI computer chip to test out how it would fare in space. Google is exploring orbital data centers in a venture it calls Project Suncatcher. And Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin announced plans in January for a constellation of more than 5,000 satellites to start launching late next year, though its focus has been more on communications than AI.

Still, Musk has an edge: He's got rockets.

Starcloud had to use one of his Falcon rockets to put its chip in space last year. Aetherflux plans to send a set of chips it calls a Galactic Brain to space on a SpaceX rocket later this year. And Google may also need to turn to Musk to get its first two planned prototype satellites off the ground by early next year.

Pierre Lionnet, a research director at the trade association Eurospace, says Musk routinely charges rivals far more than he charges himself —- as much as $20,000 per kilo of payload versus $2,000 internally.

He said Musk’s announcements this week signal that he plans to use that advantage to win this new space race.

“When he says we are going to put these data centers in space, it’s a way of telling the others we will keep these low launch costs for myself,” said Lionnet. “It’s a kind of powerplay.”

Johnson Space Center and UT partner to expand research, workforce development

onward and upward

NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston has forged a partnership with the University of Texas System to expand collaboration on research, workforce development and education that supports space exploration and national security.

“It’s an exciting time for the UT System and NASA to come together in new ways because Texas is at the epicenter of America’s space future. It’s an area where America is dominant, and we are committed as a university system to maintaining and growing that dominance,” Dr. John Zerwas, chancellor of the UT System, said in a news release.

Vanessa Wyche, director of Johnson Space Center, added that the partnership with the UT System “will enable us to meet our nation’s exploration goals and advance the future of space exploration.”

The news release noted that UT Health Houston and the UT Medical Branch in Galveston already collaborate with NASA. The UT Medical Branch’s aerospace medicine residency program and UT Health Houston’s space medicine program train NASA astronauts.

“We’re living through a unique moment where aerospace innovation, national security, economic transformation, and scientific discovery are converging like never before in Texas," Zerwas said. “UT institutions are uniquely positioned to partner with NASA in building a stronger and safer Texas.”

Zerwas became chancellor of the UT System in 2025. He joined the system in 2019 as executive vice chancellor for health affairs. Zerwas represented northwestern Ford Bend County in the Texas House from 2007 to 2019.

In 1996, he co-founded a Houston-area medical practice that became part of US Anesthesia Partners in 2012. He remained active in the practice until joining the UT System. Zerwas was chief medical officer of the Memorial Hermann Hospital System from 2003 to 2008 and was its chief physician integration officer until 2009.

Zerwas, a 1973 graduate of the Houston area’s Bellaire High School, is an alumnus of the University of Houston and Baylor College of Medicine.

3 Houston innovators who are making headlines right now

Featured Innovators

Editor's note: Houston innovators have kicked off the new year with big developments, from an immune-boosting nanodrug to NSF research funding and more. Below, meet three local innovators who have recently been in the headlines.

Kirsten Adam, Rice University

Kirsten Adam. Courtesy photo.

Rice University psychologist Kirsten Adam has received a $600,000 National Science Foundation CAREER Award to research how visual distractions like phone notifications, flashing alerts, crowded screens and busy workspaces can negatively impact focus—and how the brain works to try to regain it. Adam’s work will aim to clarify how the brain refocuses in the age of screens, instant gratification and other lingering distractions. The funding will also be used to train graduate students in advanced cognitive neuroscience methods, expand access to electroencephalography (EEG) and for public data sharing. Read more.

Houston lab-test startup seeks $1M for nationwide expansion

Jim Gebhart, founder and CEO of TheLabCafe.com. Courtesy photo.

Driven by the desire to knock down lab-test barriers, health care industry veteran Jim Gebhart founded Houston-based TheLabCafe.com in 2024. The platform provides access to low-cost medical tests without requiring patients to carry health insurance. It currently serves patients in six states and is poised for major U.S. expansion early this year. Read more.

Wei Gao, University of Houston College of Pharmacy

Wei Gao (center). Photo courtesy UH.

Wei Gao, assistant professor of pharmacology at the University of Houston College of Pharmacy, may have a solution to regulatory B cells (Bregs) which block the body's natural immunity and are found in pancreatic and lung cancers. Gao and her team have developed Nano-273, a dual-function drug, packaged in an albumin-based particle, that boosts the immune system to help it better fight these cancers. Read more.

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