Here's which of the 2022 Houston Innovation Awards finalists are hiring

Growing biz

Want to work for one of the top startups in Houston? These ones are hiring. Photo via Getty Images

After scouring Houston for the best of the Houston innovation ecosystem and evaluating dozens of companies, InnovationMap and Houston Exponential have announced the finalists that will be honored at the 2022 Houston Innovation Awards. But which of these companies are growing their teams?

Turns out, almost all of them have open positions — some planning to double their teams over the next year. In fact, the 30 companies that make up the cohort of finalists are looking for over 150 new employees — some have these positions open now and others are seeking these new team members over the next 12 months.

Click here to get your tickets to the 2022 Houston Innovation Awards Gala.
Let's look at how many new hires these top startups are looking for.

Double-digit growth

When it comes to the awards finalists looking to scale their team by 10 or more new employees, five companies are looking to enter this type of hiring spree. Blue People, a finalist in the BIPOC-Founded Category, is hiring 25 new employees. The company was founded in 2015 in Mexico and relocated its primary operations to Houston in 2020. Blue People, which develops software innovation for tis clients, has over 150 employees — seven of whom, including C-level executives, are based in Houston. Some of the company's new hires will be based in town.

Another company that's also relocated its operations to Houston recently and is growing its team significantly is Venus Aerospace, creator of a hypersonic spaceplane capable of one-hour global travel. Venus, a finalist in the New to Hou category, currently has a team of 60 people and is based out of the Houston Spaceport. The company is hiring an additional 20 people.

Fast-growing B2B Software finalist Solidatus — a data management software solution — has 16 open positions, including five in the US. According to the company, they hope to have reached a headcount of about 140 within the next 12 months — up from their current 110 employees.

NanoTech, a Green Impact finalist and materials science company, is looking to nearly double its team of 20 to add an additional 15 new employees.

Competing in the People's Choice category, LevelField Financial — a financial service platform that serves customers interested in the digital asset class — is looking to hire 10 people to join its team of 19 employees.

Steady as she grows

Six Houston Innovation Awards finalists are in the process of adding more than a few new team members. Rivalry Technologies, a finalist in the B2B Software and People's Choice categories, is hiring seven people to join its team of 13. The company created a mobile ordering solution — called sEATz — for arenas and recently rebranded and expanded to provide the technology to other industries.

Founded in New Orleans and relocated to the Houston area last year, Fluence Analytics has a total of 30 employees and is looking to hire an additional six new team members. The company, which created a real-time analytics solution for the chemicals industry, is also a finalist in two categories: Hardtech and New to Hou.

Biotech company Cemvita Factory — both a Green Impact and People's choice finalist — has already scaled to employ 75 team members. Now, the company is hiring an additional five more.

Encina Development Group — circular chemicals company for the consumer products and packaging, pharmaceuticals, construction, and other industries — is also looking to add five more team members to its 30 employees. The company is a finalist in the Green Impact category.

Another Green Impact finalist is IncentiFind, a database for green building incentives that's transforming real estate, is hiring five new employees to almost double their team of eight.

INGU, a New to Hou finalist, is a pipeline inspection solution to achieve Net Zero and ESG compliance for the water and oil and gas pipeline infrastructure. The company is seeking five new team members to join its 19 employees based in Houston and Canada.

Seeking selectively

The following awards finalists are looking to grow their teams by just a handful or so — between one and four — of new hires:

Find out which of these employers take home the win at the November 9 gala at the Ion. Click here to RSVP.

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Axiom Space officially redomiciles its headquarters in Texas

space city

Axiom Space has claimed Houston as its operational home since 2016. And now it can call Texas its official legal headquarters, too.

The spacetech company, which is developing the first commercial space station, Axiom Station, has officially redomiciled its legal headquarters from Delaware to Texas, Axiom announced this week.

Axiom employs approximately 700 people, the majority of whom are in Texas, according to a news release. Its Assembly Integration and Test Facility was built as an anchor of the Houston Spaceport, and the company is also developing next-generation spacesuits at its Houston-based spacesuit lab.

“Texas has demonstrated, consistently and deliberately, that it wants innovative companies to thrive here and has built the policy and regulatory framework accordingly,” Jonathan Cirtain, CEO and president of Axiom Space, said in the release. “For Axiom Space, establishing Texas as both our operational and legal home puts us squarely in a state that understands our mission, supports our industry, and shares in what we are working to achieve.”

Axiom touts Texas's "financial and infrastructural commitments" to the space economy as reasons for the move, including programs and grants from organizations such as the Texas Space Exploration & Aeronautics Research Fund (SEARF), the Texas Space Commission, and the Texas A&M Space Institute.

Axiom was previously awarded a $5.5 million SEARF grant for the development of its orbital data center capabilities last year.

The news comes as energy giant ExxonMobil also announced concrete plans to redomicile its legal headquarters in Texas. Exxon's board of directors unanimously recommended redomiciling in the Lone Star State in March. The company announced this week that the move would become official July 1. The company's operational headquarters is based in Spring, Texas, a Houston-area suburb.

Houston cleantech, space startups named to World Economic Forum cohort

top honor

Two Houston-based startups have been selected to join the World Economic Forum's Technology Pioneers community.

The two-year program aims to help mission-driven, early-stage start-ups scale their innovations through multi-stakeholder initiatives, co-creating partnerships and other gatherings for community members. One-hundred startups are selected each year from around the globe, this year hailing from 23 countries and working in AI, energy, space, biotech markets and more.

Cleantech startup Vaulted Deep was one of 11 energy and climate companies to be named to the cohort. Julia Reichelstein and Omar Abou-Sayed founded the company in 2023. Its technology injects excess organic waste underground to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Last year, Vaulted Deep inked a 12-year deal with Microsoft to remove up to 4.9 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from the environment.

The startup has earned several accolades in recent years, including a No. 3 spot on Fast Company’s list of the World’s Most Innovative Companies of 2026. It was also recently named to market intelligence and advisory firm Cleantech Group's annual Global Cleantech 100 list for a second year in a row.

"Waste management is one of the world's great invisible infrastructure systems ... The need for new infrastructure is growing as disposal challenges become more complex and regulations evolve. Vaulted is building the first new disposal pathway for organic waste in decades by putting it deep underground, permanently," the company shared in a LinkedIn post. "This year, we're joining the World Economic Forum's 2026 Tech Pioneers alongside innovators working on the many interconnected challenges shaping our future."

Houston-based Venus Aerospace was also selected to join the cohort, along with six other spacetech companies. The company was founded in 2020 by Sassie and Andrew Duggleby.

The startup specializes in next-generation rocket engine propulsion as a cleaner alternative to traditional combustion engines. The company's rotating detonation rocket engine (RDRE) burns fuel more efficiently and completed a successful high-thrust test flight last year. Venus says it’s the only company in the world that makes a flight-proven, high-thrust RDRE with a “clear path to scaled production.”

"Frontier technologies matter most when they expand what people, industries, and nations can do," Sassie Duggleby, co-founder and CEO of Venus, said in a news release. "For Venus, RDRE does not just represent a more efficient engine. It is a foundation for faster movement, more capable space systems, and new forms of connectivity across the planet. Being named a Technology Pioneer validates the potential of this technology to help shape a future where distance is less limiting."

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This article originally appeared on our sister site, EnergyCapitalHTX.com.

Houston Methodist receives record $110M gift, names future tower

historic gift

Houston Methodist has received the largest gift in the health system's history to establish new funds for neurological, neuroscience, and women’s health research and treatment.

The $110 million gift comes from Houston-based The Brockman Medical Research Foundation, which supports education and research in the science, medicine and healthcare fields. In response, Houston Methodist announced that it will name its forthcoming 26-story hospital facility the Brockman Centennial Tower.

The tower’s entrance will be named the Anna Margaret Bellows Centennial Hall to honor Anna Margaret Bellows, a young camper who died during the Camp Mystic flooding last summer.

“This extraordinary gift accelerates discovery and transforms how care is delivered,” Dr. Marc Boom, president and CEO of Houston Methodist, said in a news release. “We are grateful to The Brockman Medical Research Foundation for its incredible generosity and vision that will help change the lives of generations of patients. Naming Centennial Tower in recognition of this gift reflects the scale of this commitment and its impact on the future of neuroscience, neurological care and women’s health.”

The gift will be divided into two parts:

  • $100 million will go toward creating an innovation fund within the Houston Methodist Academic Institute and the Houston Methodist Neurological Institute
  • $10 million will be devoted to Houston Methodist's Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology

“This tremendous gift will accelerate translational research that broadens our understanding of neurological and other diseases,” Dr. Jenny Chang, president and CEO of the Houston Methodist Academic Institute, added in the release. “It will allow us to leverage state-of-the-art platforms to detect, diagnose and deliver therapeutics, keeping patient care at the center of our mission.”

The Brockman Centennial Tower is expected to open next year in the Texas Medical Center. Spanning more than 1 million square feet, it will house 400 patient beds, an expanded emergency department, new operating rooms and a rooftop garden. It will be connected to Houston Methodist's flagship Paula and Joseph C. “Rusty” Walter III Tower, which opened in 2018. The Centennial Tower was estimated to cost $1.4 billion when announced in 2022.

In addition to the news of the Brockman gift, Houston Methodist also announced this month that it has launched the Houston Methodist Center for Cell and Gene Therapy and tapped an internationally recognized scientist as its leader.

The new center is focused on discovering and developing innovative and cost-effective therapies for a variety of congenital and acquired diseases, including cancer, HIV and cardiovascular disease.

Dr. Malcolm Brenner has been named as the center's inaugural leader and will assume the role starting in October. He will work alongside scientists and support staff from Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children's Hospital.

Brenner is a professor of pediatrics, medicine, molecular and human genetics and translational biology at Baylor College of Medicine. He is known for making early advances in using bone marrow transplantation as a form of cell therapy and in engineered immune-cell treatments for cancer and infections, according to a release from Houston Methodist.

“Malcolm Brenner is a pioneer in the field of cell and gene therapy and is uniquely qualified to lead Houston Methodist’s research efforts in this field,” Chang added. “His vision and leadership will play a pivotal role in advancing our work in this space.”

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