Here were Houston's top 5 tech innovation stories of 2019

2019 in review

From a supercomputer making its debut in West Houston to a behind-the-scenes look at Amazon's artificial intelligence-enabled fulfillment center, these were Houston's top stories in tech. Natalie Harms/InnovationMap

Editor's note: Houston had some big stories in technology this year, from a peek inside Amazon's artificial intelligence-enabled Houston facility and the opening of a new supercomputer to space-focused Houston startups and the future of virtual reality.

Massive data center officially opens just west of Houston

Matthew Lamont is managing director at DownUnder GeoSolutions' which just opened its new, powerful data center west of Houston. Courtesy of DUG

DownUnder GeoSolutions has officially opened its new data centre in Skybox Houston in Katy, Texas. It's being billed as one of the most powerful supercomputers on earth.

The center, which houses DUG's geophysical cloud service, DUG McCloud, celebrated its grand opening on Thursday, May 16. The company's data hall has 15 megawatts of power and resides in a building designed to withstand hurricane-force winds up to 190 mph.

A second, identical hall is already planned to be built out later this year. Together, the two machines will have a capacity of 650 petaflop, which is a measurement of computing speed that's equal to one thousand million million floating-point operations per second. Continue reading.

5 startups keeping Houston known as the Space City

Houston celebrated 50 years since the Apollo moon landing on July 20. Here are some startups that are going to be a part of the next 50 years of space tech in Houston. Photo via NASA.gov

This month, for the most part, has been looking back on the history Houston has as the Space City in honor of the 50th anniversary of the moon landing on July 20. While it's great to recognize the men and women who made this city the major player in space exploration that it is, there are still entrepreneurs today with space applications and experience that represent the future of the Space City. Continue reading.

How Amazon's Houston fulfillment center uses AI technology and robotics to move millions of products

From robotics to artificial intelligence, here's how Amazon gets its products to Houstonians in record time. Photo by Natalie Harms/InnovationMap

Last summer, Amazon opened the doors to its North Houston distribution center — one of the company's 50 centers worldwide that uses automation and robotics to fulfill online orders.

The Pinto Business Park facility has millions of products in inventory across four floors. Products that are 25 pounds or less (nothing heavier is stocked at this location) pass through 20 miles of conveyor belts, 1,500 employees, and hundreds of robots.

The center also has daily tours open to the public. We recently visited to see for ourselves the process a product goes through at this Houston plant. From stowing to shipping, here's how packages go from your shopping cart to your front porch. Continue reading.

Developments in virtual reality technology are changing the workforce, say Houston experts

The solution to Houston's workforce problem might be right in front of our eyes. Getty Images

Everyone's job has training associated with it — from surgeons to construction crane operators — and there's a growing market need for faster, more thorough training of our workforce.

"The best way to learn how to do something, is to just get out and do it," says Eric Liga, co-founder of HoustonVR. "But there are a lot of reasons why you can't do that in certain types of training."

Augmented and virtual reality training programs are on the rise, and Liga cites safety, cost, and unpredictable work environments as some of these most obvious reasons reasons to pivot to training employees through extended reality. This type of training also provides portability and has proven higher retention, Liga says in his keynote speech at Station Houston's AR/VR discuss on April 25.

"You get a much higher retention rate when you actually go out and do something — physically going through the motions — than you do sitting in a classroom or reading a book," he says. Continue reading.

Recently renovated Downtown Houston office space snags leases from 2 tech companies

Main&Co's office space is now 100 percent leased. Courtesy of Main&Co

Two tech-focused companies moved into a newly developed office space in downtown Houston at the intersection of Main Street and Commerce Street. One company relocated its Houston office, and the other company has expanded to the city for the first time.

Oil and gas AI-enabled analytics platform, Ruths.ai relocated its downtown office to Main&Co, located at 114 Main St. The company has 8,457 square feet of office space in the recently renovated historic building.

Meanwhile, global robotics process automation company UiPath has expanded to build a Houston team. The computer software company is based in New York, but has a presence in 18 countries. The company's office has 5,187 square feet of Main&Co's office space. Continue reading.

This week's top stories are all about big things coming to Houston, including The MKT. Courtesy of The MKT

5 most popular innovation stories in Houston this week

What's trending

This week's trending news definitely has a theme. InnovationMap readers flocked to big news stories about projects or promises not only delivering soon, but with so much more up their sleeves — five promises the mayor had for Houston, a huge mixed-use project already planning phase two, and a supercomputer named Bubba who has a twin already in the making.

Need more than just trending news on Fridays? Subscribe to our daily newsletter that sends fresh stories straight to your inboxes every morning.

Massive data center officially opens just west of Houston

Matthew Lamont is managing director at DownUnder GeoSolutions' which just opened its new, powerful data center west of Houston. Courtesy of DUG

DownUnder GeoSolutions has officially opened its new data centre in Skybox Houston in Katy, Texas. It's being billed as one of the most powerful supercomputers on earth.

The center, which houses DUG's geophysical cloud service, DUG McCloud, celebrated its grand opening on Thursday, May 16. The company's data hall has 15 megawatts of power and resides in a building designed to withstand hurricane-force winds up to 190 mph. Read more about DUG's new center out west.

Photos: The Cannon enters home stretch ahead of opening next month

The Cannon is expecting to open by the end of next month. Courtesy of The Cannon

If all goes according to plan, The Cannon's new space will be up and running by the end of June. The bulk of the construction, which started a little over a year ago, is done, and the team is on the home stretch. Read the story and check out renderings and progress photos.

3 Houston innovators to know this week

The three Houston innovators to know this week represent new, exciting things for the innovation ecosystem. Courtesy photos

The movers and shakers within the Houston innovation ecosystem come from all kinds of industries — from private equity to supercomputing. This week's innovators to know reflect that industry diversity and are bringing something new to the table. Meet this week's Houston innovators.

5 things Mayor Turner promised Houston in his State of the City Address

Mayor Sylvester Turner talked parks, innovation, firefighter salaries, and more at the Greater Houston Partnership's State of the City. Natalie Harms/InnovationMap

In the 2019 State of the City Address hosted by the Greater Houston Partnership on May 20, Mayor Sylvester Turner took the stage at the Marriott Marquis in front of over 1,500 Houstonians.

Some of the obvious topics were of course on the table — pension reform, hurricane recovery, job growth — but Mayor Turner surprised attendees with the announcement of a public-private parks program and again alluded to the re-envisioned of Astroworld. Here's what the mayor wants to bring to Houston.

Massive mixed-use project to bring creative office and coworking space to the Houston Heights

The MKT expects to revolutionize the live-work-play model with everything from retail and restaurant to office and coworking space. Courtesy of The MKT

On a stroll or a spin down the Heights Hike and Bike Trail, you might not notice a complete transformation is eminent. The MKT — a mixed-use renovation and build out project — is getting ready to break ground.

The five-building, 200,000-square-foot project will bring 30 retail and restaurant concepts, and 100,000 square feet of office space together along with four acres of green space, parking, and an outdoor venue alongside 1,000 linear feet of the trail between North Shepherd Drive and Herkimer Street. The MKT name comes from the Missouri-Kansas-Texas railroad — later known as the Katy Railroad — that was transformed into the Heights Hike and Bike Trail. Read the story and check out all the renderings.

The three Houston innovators to know this week represent new, exciting things for the innovation ecosystem. Courtesy photos

3 Houston innovators to know this week

Who's who

The movers and shakers within the Houston innovation ecosystem come from all kinds of industries — from private equity to supercomputing. This week's innovators to know reflect that industry diversity and are bringing something new to the table.

Jon Nordby, managing director of Houston's MassChallenge Texas chapter

Jon Nordby, former exec at Houston Exponential, will lead the inaugural Houston MassChallenge cohort. Courtesy of MassChallenge

Jon Nordby, who recently served as Houston Exponential's director of strategy since its launch, was named as the managing director of MassChallenge Texas in Houston, a zero-equity startup accelerator.

"MassChallenge's not-for-profit, no equity model is uniquely suited to accelerate the development of Houston's innovation ecosystem and is the foundation early-stage startups need to get to the point of disruption or pivot as fast as possible," says Nordby in a release.

Before HX, Nordby served as vice president of talent and innovation at the Greater Houston Partnership, and was essential in creating the organization's Innovation Initiative. Click here to learn more about the appointment.

Matthew Lamont, managing director at DownUnder GeoSolutions

Matthew Lamont is managing director at DownUnder GeoSolutions which just opened its new, powerful data center west of Houston. Courtesy of DUG

Matthew Lamont isn't technically a Houstonian, but the managing director of Perth, Australia-based DownUnder GeoSolutions gets the honorary title for bringing one of the world's most powerful supercomputers, nicknamed Bubba, to the Houston area. In fact, perhaps Lamont accepts the recognition on behalf of Bubba, who — while inanimate — is definitely a Houstonian.

DUG is heavily investing in Houston, and Bubba is just the start. The company plans to start on a friend for Bubba later this year and bring an even more powerful supercomputer to the market by 2021. Read more about Lamont, Bubba, and all that DUG is doing in Houston here.

Taseer Badar, founder and CEO of ZT Corporate

Taseer Badar is in the business of making money. Courtesy of ZT Corporate

Taseer Badar will shoot it to you straight: Houston startups struggling to find capital might need to look nationally or globally.

"Investors in Houston want positive earnings before interest, tax, and amortization," he says. "But that doesn't mean it's not possible in New York, Dallas, Austin, or other cities. There are technology conferences everywhere, that's a great way to get known as a startup."

As CEO and founder of ZT Corporate with 1,000 investors to manage, he knows private equity, and what it takes to invest. Read more about Badar here.

Matthew Lamont is managing director at DownUnder GeoSolutions' which just opened its new, powerful data center west of Houston. Courtesy of DUG

Massive data center officially opens just west of Houston

Now online

DownUnder GeoSolutions has officially opened its new data centre in Skybox Houston in Katy, Texas. It's being billed as one of the most powerful supercomputers on earth.

The center, which houses DUG's geophysical cloud service, DUG McCloud, celebrated its grand opening on Thursday, May 16. The company's data hall has 15 megawatts of power and resides in a building designed to withstand hurricane-force winds up to 190 mph.

A second, identical hall is already planned to be built out later this year. Together, the two machines will have a capacity of 650 petaflop, which is a measurement of computing speed that's equal to one thousand million million floating-point operations per second.

In addition to the second hall, DUG is working to build another giant computing system with exaflop capacity — a billion billion calculations per second — by 2021.

"We are in a race to build the first exascale supercomputing system," says Phil Schwan, CTO for DUG, in a news release.

Australia-based DUG first started construction on Bubba, the nickname for the machine, last year and chose Skybox Datacenters as the facility to put Bubba in after a global search. The supercomputer landing in Houston represented the largest data center transaction in the Houston area's history. Dallas-Fort Worth, Austin, and San Antonio have long overshadowed Houston as hotspots for data center activity in Texas.

An differentiating asset of Bubba is the cooling process, which reduces energy usage and costs. Thirteen miles of pipes connect the hard drives to 20-foot cooling towers. Bubba uses "its own patented immersion system that submerges the computer nodes in more than 700 specially-designed tanks filled with polyalphaolefin dielectric fluid," according to the release.

"The complete DUG Insight software suite is available, and is fully-optimised to run on the cloud," says DUG's managing director, Matthew Lamont.

DUG's device is based on Intel® Xeon® processors, and the company uses Intel's technology to enhance its services, and there are more than 40,000 Intel Xeon processor nodes within the DUG McCloud network.

"The close collaboration between our two companies ensures DUG customers have access to the compute resources needed to obtain more meaningful insights from the geophysical landscapes they are exploring," says Trish Damkroger, vice president and general manager of Intel's Extreme Computing Organization, in a release.

"The Bubba supercomputer is a tremendous addition to the DUG McCloud network, and we look forward to our continued collaboration to build even more powerful systems to help accelerate this research and development."

Super-sized supercomputer

Natalie Harms/InnovationMap

Bubba, as the machine is called, has 15 megawatts of power and resides in a building designed to withstand hurricane-force winds up to 190 mph.

DownUnder GeoSolutions, which has its U.S. headquarters in Houston, is getting ready to flip the switch on what is being billed as the world's fastest supercomputer. Photo via DUG.com

World's fastest supercomputer is getting ready to power on in Houston

Booting up

An Australian company that provides geoscience and tech services to the oil and gas industry is gearing up to flip the switch in Katy on what's being billed as the world's fastest supercomputer.

At the 20-acre Skybox Houston data center campus in the Energy Corridor, DownUnder GeoSolutions is assembling a 15-megawatt data center that will house more than 40,000 servers to create the world's fastest supercomputer. Houston is the U.S. headquarters for DUG.

The data center will power a cloud computing service, known as DUG McCloud, that's tailored to the geosciences sector. The company says DUG McCloud will supply "enormous" computing capacity and high-performance storage for DUG's cloud business.

Construction on DUG McCloud — which has been delayed due to recent heavy rains — is set to be completed in April, according to the company's blog.

"DUG McCloud will be available to external companies to expand their computational resources on demand," the company says on its blog. "In addition, the cloud service will give clients access to DUG's proprietary software, with the option of source code, to accelerate their research, development, and production."

DUG McCloud is being touted as the world's biggest cloud computing service for the oil and gas industry. Among its prospective clients are global oil companies, government-owned oil producers, seismic contractors, and data companies.

"DUG McCloud is offering a wide range of companies the opportunity to significantly accelerate their oil and gas projects with cutting-edge geophysical software, stacked with extraordinary supercomputer power and services," Mick Lambert, the newly hired manager of DUG McCloud, said in December.

So, just how extraordinary will DUG's new supercomputer be?

DUG's equipment — contained in a building designed to withstand hurricane-force winds up to 190 mph — will offer more than 250 single-precision petaflops of computing speed, or 250,000 trillion calculations per second.

For now, the world's fastest supercomputer is Summit, a collaboration between the U.S. Department of Energy and IBM. Its top speed is 200 petaflops. Summit operates at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.

Over the long term, DUG envisions its data center being able to handle exascale computing, capable of generating at least 1 quintillion calculations per second. A quintillion has twice as many zeroes as a billion does. China is set to debut the world's first exascale supercomputer in 2020 — a year ahead of the first one to be established in the U.S., a $500 million public-private project called Aurora being developed by the Department of Energy and Intel.

DUG's deal for its data center in Katy represents the largest data center transaction in the Houston area's history. Dallas-Fort Worth, Austin, and San Antonio have long overshadowed Houston as hotspots for data center activity in Texas.

Matthew Lamont, co-founder of DUG, said in October that the company conducted an "exhaustive" search for the data center. "Houston was a natural choice," he said, "given the low cost of power and the fact that Skybox had the available infrastructure ready to go."

A unique feature of DUG's data center is how the servers will be cooled. The company's patent-pending DUG Cool system will immerse all of the servers in custom-designed tanks filled with an environmentally friendly cooling fluid.

DUG says this fluid enables condensed water-cooling chillers to be used to cool the servers, rather than server fans and refrigeration units. This will reduce energy consumption by 45 percent compared with traditional air-cooled systems, according to DUG.

"We like to call it the greenest cloud service in the world," Lamont said on DUG's blog. "DUG McCloud certainly offers more than just a silver lining."

The DUG center represents about 65 percent of the 23 megawatts of data center space under construction in the Houston area, according to a new report from commercial real estate services company CBRE.

"As high-performance computing continues to grow in importance to the energy sector, it is likely that additional latency-sensitive deployments will grow in the Houston market," Haynes Strader, senior associate at CBRE, says in a news release.

"Latency-sensitive" refers to the need for technology to act quickly in response to various events.

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Air taxi network to land in 'Texas triangle' of Houston, Austin, DFW next year

taking flight

San Jose, California-based aerospace company Archer Aviation is bringing its air-taxi system to the “Texas triangle” of Houston, Austin and Dallas-Fort Worth.

Currently, the planned zero-emission electric air taxi networks will use Archer’s Midnight air taxi to “turn 60- to 90-minute drives to major airports, business districts and major destinations into 10- to 20-minute flights,” the company said in a news release. Archer plans to begin flights in the Texas triangle next year.

The Midnight air taxi is an all-electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft. It can carry four passengers and a pilot and is designed for consecutive flights of about 20 miles.

Archer cites the Texas triangle as one of the busiest and fastest-growing “megaregions” in the country due to its proximity to coastal regions, major airports, and a number of business districts.

Archer Chief Commercial Officer Nikhil Goel described the air taxi experience to CW Houston as “100 times quieter than a helicopter for the price of an Uber Black.” He added that the air taxis are a combination of a helicopter, a small airplane and a drone.

In Houston, Archer’s air taxi network will aim to connect George Bush Intercontinental, William P. Hobby and Sugar Land Regional Airport with downtown destinations, including the Thompson Hotel helipad, and Galveston.

In Austin, it plans to link the city's Austin-Bergstrom International Airport and Austin Executive Airport with the F1 Circuit Helipad at the Circuit of the Americas. Archer debuted its Midnight aircraft at the F1 Prix in the Fan Zone and the F1 Paddock at Austin’s Circuit of the Americas. The Dallas-Fort Worth network is slated to include Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, Dallas Love Field, Addison Airport, Arlington Municipal Airport, Fort Worth Meacham International Airport and Perot Field Fort Worth Alliance Airport, plus major business hubs like Frisco Station.

“Texas is setting the bar for America’s leadership in the next generation of aviation,” Adam Goldstein, founder and CEO of Archer Aviation, said in the release. “Our planned networks will make the benefits of electric air taxis real for Texans — trading hours in traffic for minutes in the air, while connecting the biggest airports, business districts and sporting hubs in ways that America’s largest megaregion needs to grow.”

Archer is working with state and local partners to develop charging infrastructure and plans to pursue Texas operations through the White House’s eVTOL Integration Pilot Program, according to the release. It recently completed its "No Roads" flight tour, which included multiple flights over the San Francisco Bay, and flew to seven cities over three days.

5 Houston deep tech startups pushing the boundaries of their industries

meet the finalists

Houston has long been at the forefront of innovation, from NASA’s Johnson Space Center to its startup ecosystem using technology to disrupt industries.

As part of the 2026 Houston Innovation Awards, our Deep Tech Business category will honor an innovative startup providing technology solutions based on substantial scientific or engineering challenges, including those in the AI, robotics and space sectors.

Five deep tech companies have been named finalists for the 2026 award.

Read more about these businesses, their founders and their breakthrough technologies below. The 2026 winners will be announced on InnovationMap.com in mid-November.

Casimir

Battery tech startup Casimir develops semiconductor chips that produce continuous electrical power straight from the quantum vacuum, without the need for a battery, cord or external charge source. The company is targeting commercialization for its first-generation MicroSparc chip by 2028.

Harold “Sonny” White founded Casimir in 2023 after nearly two decades at NASA. The company emerged from stealth with a $12 million seed round in 2026. It was also awarded an STTR Phase I contract from the U.S. Space Force's SpaceWERX to support the development of the company's solid-state generator for potential use by the Department of the Air Force earlier this year.

FocisAI

Artificial intelligence startup FocisAI helps refinery owner-operators unlock actionable insights from 3D scans and images.

FocisAI was founded by CEO Tyler Wooten, COO Colin Snell and CTO Kyle Snell in 2026. It is a member of Greentown Labs and launched a seed round in September, which is expected to close by the end of the year, according to the company's application. It has rolled out 10 pilot programs and is looking to move into recurring, facility-scale deployments and scale its team in Houston this year.

Machine Saver Inc.

Industrial tech startup Machine Saver Inc. builds wireless and wired vibration and proximity sensors to tell heavy industry when a machine is about to fail. The company's technology runs on an 8-plus-year battery life and helps operators reduce downtime, improve maintenance and extend equipment life.

Machine Saver was founded by CEO Colton Bach and Quentin Bach in 2013. Its customers and partners include Houston Methodist, Blue Bell, Genemco, as well as energy and heavy industry, food and beverage, and cold chain companies, according to its application. The company is raising a Series A.

Square Robot

Energytech startup Square Robot develops and operates submersible inspection robotics that inspect aboveground storage tanks while they remain in service. The robots reduce downtime and costs, improve worker safety and limit hydrocarbon emissions.

Square Robot launched its Houston office in 2019 and closed a Series B in 2025. It plans to complete its first U.S. Navy demonstrator tank in November and is also developing real-time inspection software.

Venus Aerospace

Spacetech company Venus Aerospace is developing a high-thrust rotating detonation rocket engine (RDRE) that replaces the subsonic combustion used in conventional rocket engines. The RDRE is a compact, simpler engine that can deliver up to 15 percent greater efficiency for defense and space applications. It completed its first U.S. flight test of the engine last summer.

Venus Aerospace was founded in 2020 by CEO Cassie Duggleby and CTO Andrew Duggleby. It raised a $20 million Series A in 2022 and $42 million Series A2 in 2025. It closed a $91 million Series B earlier this year and expanded its leadership team. The company is working toward longer-duration and higher-thrust testing and advancing its flight program.

Houston leads U.S. with the biggest surge in millionaire renters

Rent Report

The number of millionaire renters and homeowners in the U.S. has surged over the last five years, and Houston has soared ahead of the rest with the largest growth rate among these affluent renter households.

Houston leads the nation with the No. 1 increase in millionaire renters from 2020 to 2024, a new RentCafe study found. The number of these wealthy households increased from 18 to 232 over the last five years, representing a 1,189 percent growth rate.

"The pandemic accelerated the shift as remote work pushed the wealthy to relocate to lower-tax metros like Houston, where millionaire renters grew 13-fold, versus 3.9-fold for owners," the report said. "Granted, 232 households is still a tiny fraction of the Houston metro’s roughly 2.7 million households, but the growth rate far outpaces any other major metro."

Nationwide, the number of millionaire renter households grew 229 percent from 2020 to 2024, outpacing the 193 percent growth rate among millionaire homeowners.

Dallas was the only other Texas metro to crack the top 10. The number of millionaire renter households in North Texas has more than quintupled, from just 30 in 2020 to 165 in 2024. That represents a growth rate of 450 percent, which — surprisingly — is only the eighth highest nationwide.

But when it comes to the largest populations of millionaire renters, New York City and San Francisco still lead the way. New York claimed the No. 1 spot with nearly 7,300 millionaire renters living in the city in 2024. Houston ranked 12th on that list.

Elsewhere in Texas, Austin and Dallas ranked as the 16th and 17th, respectively, for the largest population of millionaire renters. There were 206 millionaire renters living in Austin in 2024, and 165 in Dallas.

This is who the typical millionaire renter is
The report also revealed a surprising statistic about the typical millionaire renter in the U.S. — a lot of them are millennials working in "white-collar, high-earning fields."

"Nearly half (49 percent) of millionaire renters are Millennials, and the number of affluent Millennial renter households surged 392 percent during the five-year period," the report said. "Gen X follows with 33 percent of millionaire Gen X households renting after increasing by 147 percent."

The report continued, "Although Gen Z still represents a small share of millionaire renters (just 2 percent of the total), no generation has expanded faster: Gen Z millionaire renter households leaped from fewer than a dozen to more than 400 — a tiny cohort today, but one that was virtually nonexistent five years ago."

The top three most common professions for millionaire renters are chief executives, software developers, and managers, the report additionally found. In Houston, the surge of wealthy newcomers are mostly executives, professional athletes, and entertainers.

"These roles tend to generate steady, substantial income without necessarily tying workers to one location, making renting a practical fit, rather than a financial necessity," the report said.

Hotspots for millionaire homeowners
In RentCafe's separate list comparing the top 10 most popular U.S. metros for millionaire homeowners, Houston ranked 12th nationally with 4,374 millioniare homeowners living in the metro as of 2024. These wealthy Houstonians are most likely working as chief executives, physicians, managers, and lawyers and judges.

Houston has already proven to be a hotspot for millennial homebuyers, and the latest RentCafe data says millennials make up 19 percent of all millionaire homeowners in the U.S. Gen Xers and Baby Boomers still maintain the largest shares of millionaire homeowners nationwide, at 45 and 33 percent, respectively.

Dallas (No. 10) and Austin (No. 20) also appeared among the hottest metros for millionaire homeowners.

Only one Texas city appeared among RentCafe's list of the 20 fastest-growing metros for millionaire homeowners: College Station ranked 13th nationwide with a growth rate of 1,329 percent. From 2020-2024, the number of millionaire homeowners residing in College Station grew from 14 to 200.

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This article originally appeared on CultureMap.com.

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