5 Houston-area space companies score ISS contracts with NASA

ready for takeoff

NASA selected 12 companies to provide services to its ISS program and five hail from just down the road of the program. Photo via nasa.gov

NASA has tapped a dozen companies to work on services for the International Space Station Program, and five come from the greater Houston region.

Houston-based Aegis Aerospace Inc., Cimarron Software Services, JES Tech, and Oceaneering were are all admitted to the program, as was Webster-based Leidos. The companies, along with the other seven selected, will provide research, engineering, and/or mission integration services to the ISS.

The program, which is based at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, is supported by a $478 million Research, Engineering & Mission Integration Services-2 or REMIS-2 contract, according to NASA.

The other selected companies are:

  • Axient Corp, based in Huntsville, Alabama
  • Consolidated Safety Services, based in Exploration Park, Florida
  • KBR Wyle, based in Fulton, Maryland
  • Metis, based in Albuquerque, New Mexico
  • Tec-Masters, based in Huntsville
  • Teledyne Brown Engineering, based in Huntsville
  • University of Alabama at Birmingham, Alabama

"The companies will provide spaceflight, ground hardware and software, sustaining engineering functions and services, payload facility integration, and research mission integration operations services," reads a NASA news release. "The majority of the work will take place at contractor facilities across the country. Services also may be required at other NASA centers, contractor or subcontractor locations, or vendor facilities as requirements warrant."

Each of the selected companies will receive a "multiple-award, indefinite-quantity contract with firm-fixed price and cost-plus-fixed-fee task orders." The contract officially began January 12 and extends through Sept. 30, 2030, with an option to extend through Sept. 30, 2032.

Half of the selected companies — Aegis, Cimarron, Consolidated Safety Services, JES Tech, Metis, and Tec-Masters — are small businesses and were selected as a part of the contract's small business reserve.

Women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics are well represented in Houston, according to a recent report. Photo via Christina Morillo/Pexels

Houston named a top city for women in STEM fields

who runs the world?

If you're a woman in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics and you call Houston home, according to a new report, you're doing it right.

In honor of Women's History Month, CommercialCafe updated its 2020 ranking of the top U.S. cities for women working in STEM. According to the report, Houston ranks at No. 5 on the list of the best southern cities in the United States for women in STEM. The Bayou City also claims the No. 19 spot nationally.

Here are some other key findings about Houston on the report:

  • STEM jobs in Houston account for 7 percent of all jobs, and a little less than a third of these positions are held by women.
  • About 23,964 women work in STEM in Houston — which is the most out of any other city in the South.
  • Houston gained 4,318 new women STEM employees since 2015, the third-highest number in this regional ranking.
  • The median annual income for women in STEM here is $68,172.
Texas makes up about half of the top 10 Southern states — Austin places in second, while Frisco (No. 7), Dallas (No. 8) and Plano (No. 10) fall behind Houston. Nationally, New York City, San Francisco, and Seattle take the top three spots, respectively.

Women working in STEM - South 2021 - Infograminfogram.com

Houston has been recognized for its STEM fields before, and last fall, SmartAsset ranked Houston as No. 7 in STEM nationally based on workforce size. And, in 2019, Houston placed sixth for STEM workforce diversity. Last year Houston also ranked No. 6 for women in tech, also according to SmartAsset.

Houston isn't very attractive of an ecosystem for STEM professionals, according to a new report. Getty Images

​​Report finds Houston has room to grow as an attractive city for STEM professionals​​

Needs improvement

Houston has been heralded as a great place to find a job in many instances, so it may come as some surprise that when it comes to science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, the Bayou City isn't primed for professionals.

The city ranked No. 33 out of the 100 largest metros in the United States in a study conducted by WalletHub. The 17 metrics corresponded to professional opportunities, STEM friendliness, or quality of life. Within those categories, Houston ranked No. 47, No. 20, and No. 54, respectively.

Some of the areas where the Houston area stood out is wage, engineering educational opportunities, and projected demand for STEM jobs in 2020. Houston had the highest annual median wage for STEM workers, which was adjusted for cost of living.

While Houston seems to be predicted to need STEM professionals, the city currently has among the worst STEM employment growth and among the highest unemployment rate for STEM professionals with a Bachelor's degree or higher.

Austin, which ranked at No. 4, was the only Texas city to rank higher than Houston, and Dallas followed close behind Houston at No. 38. Dallas actually performed similar to Houston across the categories, while Austin's scores reflected that the city provided the 8th best STEM professional opportunities in the country.

Rounding out the top five on the list was Seattle at No. 1, Boston at No. 2, Pittsburgh at No. 3, and San Francisco at No.5.

In November, Accenture's Brian Richards wrote a guest column for InnovationMap on how Houston could advance as a premier city for tech and innovation. He proffered that STEM talent is a key component the city needs — both coming into the ecosystem as well as remaining here.

"Houston already has tremendous amounts of STEM talent but doesn't produce enough talent or retain enough of the locally-grown talent," he writes. "To jumpstart, we are going to have to import it initially."

Apparently, this isn't an issue unique to Houston. According to Martin Storksdieck, director for the Center for Research on Lifelong STEM Learning in Oregon, while the U.S. has been successfully attracting outsiders to STEM higher education roles, there's a growing need for specific STEM jobs like nurses and computer scientists.

"The US is neither creating, attracting nor retaining middle-skilled STEM professionals in any competitive fashion," Storksdieck says in the report. "[Meanwhile], about half of academic STEM graduate students in the US are foreign born."

Dyan Gibbens translated her Air Force experience with unmanned missiles into a drone services company. Courtesy of Alice

Houston drone company has big business on the horizon

The sky's the limit

Dyan Gibbens found her dream career. She studied engineering, learned to fly at the United States Air Force Academy, went into pilot training, and served as engineering acquisitions officer managing stealth nuclear cruise missiles. She even went on to support Air Force One and Global Hawk UAS engineering and logistics. She dedicated five years to active service before transitioning to the reserves.

"When I went to transition, I learned I was permanently disqualified from ever serving again," Gibbens said. "It was devastating to me, because all I've ever wanted to do was serve."

She went into a doctorate program — she already had her MBA — and was close to finishing up when her drone startup took flight. Trumbull Unmanned provides drone services to the energy sector for various purposes. With her experience as a pilot and managing unmanned missiles, she knew the demand for drones was only growing — and, being from Texas, she knew what industry to focus on.

"I wanted to start a company that uses unmanned systems or drones to improve safety and improve the environment and support energy,"

InnovationMap: What exactly does Trumbull Unmanned do?

Dyan Gibbens: We fly drones in challenging and austere environments to collect and analyze data for the energy sector. We fly across upstream, midstream, and downstream either on or off shore. We focus on three areas: digital transformation, inspection and operations, and technology development and integration.

The types data we collect and analyze could be LiDAR — light detection and ranging — to multispectral — to see the help of different properties — to visible — to perform tech-enabled inspections. We've recently hired inspectors in house as well. On LiDAR, we just hired a subject matter expert.

IM: So, the company is growing. What else is new for Trumbull?

DG: We just signed a few five-year agreements with supermajors. We're excited about that and the new hires. We're starting to do more on communications and situational awareness. We're doing more in energy and now in the government.

IM: What were some early challenges you faced?

DG: We are 100 percent organically funded — from our savings and from client contracts. Our first client was ExxonMobil. Our second client was Chevron. We had to prove ourselves over and over. We had to work hard to earn and then maintain that business. For us, it was also adjusting to a fluctuation in cash flow. It was going from a steady job to betting on yourself, and we didn't know anyone in Houston.

IM: What's the state of drone technology in the field?

DG: We've continued to see a hybrid approach toward services. Meaning, there's an in-house component and outsourced component. On the outsourced component, we intend to provide that for our clients. On the in-house component, while we don't train the masses, we do train our clients on request. We've promoted that model from the beginning. We think it makes sense that they are trained to do something simple, like take a picture, but for some of the more difficult projects, they outsource to us.

We're going to continue to see increased autonomy. There are really some amazing things already in autonomy, but there's still a lot of challenges flying in dense environments such as refineries and plants.

IM: How is Houston's startup scenes for veterans? What resources are out there?

DG: The way I see it is veterans have made a commitment to serve us, so we should make a commitment to serve them. That's my philosophy. Large companies have different programs, which is great, and there are entities such as Combined Arms, which has full services for transitioning veterans where you can go in and one-stop shop to get support from everything like getting connected to the VA to help working through PTSD to getting help transitioning to business. There are also really good Service Academy networks. More and more opportunities exist to step up to serve veterans.

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Portions of this interview have been edited.

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Pharma giant considers Houston for $1B manufacturing campus

in the works

Another pharmaceutical giant is considering Houston’s Generation Park for a manufacturing hub.

According to a recent filing with the Texas Jobs, Energy, Technology and Innovation (JETI) program, Bristol Myers Squibb Co. is considering the northeast Houston management district for a new $1 billion multi-modal pharmaceutical manufacturing campus.

If approved, the campus, known as Project Argonaut, could create 489 jobs in Texas by 2031. Jobs would include operations technicians, engineering roles, administrative and management roles, production specialists, maintenance support, and quality control/assurance. The company predicts annual average wages for these positions to be around $96,000, according to the filing.

The project currently includes the 600,000-square-foot facility, but according to the filing, Bristol Myers Squibb “envisions this site growing in scale and capability well beyond its opening configuration."

The Texas JETI program offers companies temporary school property tax limitations in exchange for major capital investment and job creation. E.R. Squibb & Sons LLC applied for a 10-year tax abatement agreement in the Sheldon Independent School District.

The agreement promises a $ 1 billion investment. Construction would begin in 2027 and wrap in 2029.

“The proposed project reflects [Bristol Myers Squibb Co.’s] enduring commitment to bringing innovative medicines to patients and ensuring the long-term supply reliability they depend on,” the filing says. “The proposed project is purpose-built to support and manufacture medicines spanning multiple therapeutic areas and modalities, positioning the site as a long-term launch and commercial campus for decades to come. These medicines will provide therapies to the [Bristol Myers Squibb Co.’s] patients located in markets both nationally and internationally.”

The Fortune 100 company is considering 16 other cities for the new manufacturing facility in the Central and Eastern markets in the U.S. According to the Houston Chronicle, Bristol Myers Squibb Co is still in the “evaluation process” for its potential manufacturing site.

Last fall, Eli Lilly and Co. selected Generation Park for its $6.5 billion manufacturing plant. More than 300 locations in the U.S. competed for the factory. Read more here.

Houston health tech co. lands NIH grant for AI cancer prediction tool

fresh funding

Houston-based CellChorus and Stanford Medicine were recently awarded a Phase I Small Business Innovation Research grant for the company's AI platform to test how certain cancer patients will respond to therapies.

The funding comes from the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health. According to a filing, the grant totaled just under $400,000.

CellChorus, which spun out from the University of Houston’s Technology Bridge, has developed TIMING (Time-lapse Imaging Microscopy In Nanowell Grids), which analyzes the behavior of thousands of individual immune cells over time and can identify early indicators of treatment success or failure.

The company will work with Stanford's Dr. David Miklos and Dr. Saurabh Dahiya, who have built the Bone Marrow Transplantation and Cell Therapy Biobank. The biobank manages and stores biological samples from patients treated at their clinic and in clinical trials.

"Predicting which patients will achieve durable responses after CAR-T therapy remains one of the most important challenges in the field,” Miklos said in a news release. “We aim to uncover functional cellular signatures that can guide treatment decisions and improve patient outcomes.”

The project will specifically profile cells from patients with relapsed/refractory large B-cell lymphoma (r/rLBCL). According to CellChorus, only about half of r/rLBCL patients who receive CAR-T therapy "achieve a durable, long-term remission." Others do not respond to therapy or experience relapse.

“The sooner we know whether a cancer therapy is working, the better. To maximize patient benefit, we need technology that can provide a robust and early prediction of response to therapy. The technology needs to be scalable, cost-efficient, and capable of rapid turnaround times,” Rebecca Berdeaux, chief scientific officer of CellChorus, added in the release. “We are excited to work with Drs. David Miklos and Saurabh Dahiya and their colleagues on this very important project.”

CellChorus has previously received SBIR grants from federal agencies, including a $2.5 million award in 2024 from its National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) and a $2.3 million SBIR Fast-Track award from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences in 2023.

Houston museum showcases America's founding documents in rare exhibit

Experience History

As the United States prepares to celebrate its 250th birthday, Houstonians have a chance to see rare documents from the founding of the nation. Freedom Plane National Tour: Documents That Forged a Nation, presented by the National Archives Foundation, will be on display at the Houston Museum of Natural Science through Monday, May 25.

The collection includes a rare engraving of the original Declaration of Independence; official Oaths of Allegiance signed by George Washington, Aaron Burr, and Alexander Hamilton; a draft of the Bill of Rights; the Treaty of Paris, the documented that recognized America's independence from Great Britain; and the tally of votes approving the Constitution.

The National Archives specifically chose Houston as one of only eight cities in the country to host the exhibit as a means to help the documents reach a wider audience outside of the main hub of semiquincentennial events in New England and the Washington, D.C. area.

"One of the things we decided when we put the tour together because we wanted to be off the East Coast," said Patrick Madden, CEO of the National Archives Foundation, who was onsite for the exhibit's opening in Houston. "There's a lot of 250th celebration stuff happening in the original 13 colonies. How do we get it to major markets where larger numbers of people can see it? So in the case of Houston, obviously, [is a] major market in this part of the country, but also we've partnered with the museum twice before with National Archives exhibits, so we knew that they would be up to the task of handling the exhibit and the crowds."

The star of the collection is a rare engraving of the original Declaration of Independence. Secretary of State and future president John Quincy Adams commissioned 200 exact replicas of the document from engraver William J. Stone in 1823. Less than 50 now remain. Madden joyfully pointed out that there are errors in this document, a potent reminder that the men who forged a nation made mistakes.

"There's a couple of typos in it where they had to make corrections," said Madden. "So even the founders, you know, they're all human. That resonates because here these people are making this move against the most powerful nation in the world and putting their lives on the line for a country based on ideas."

Other impressive parts of the collection include official Oaths of Allegiance signed by George Washington, Aaron Burr, and Alexander Hamilton, as well as one of the drafts of the Bill of Rights. Many states would not ratify the Constitution until certain rights were included in the document, leading to Washington going on a national tour assuring state leaders enshrining protections was first on the list. The draft copy on display specifically shows the First Amendment in progress.

Houston is the fourth stop on the exhibition's tour, which will take the documents to Denver, Miami, Dearborn, and Seattle through the summer. Freedom Plane is just one part of a larger patriotic celebration at the HMNS, which includes a film series celebrating American science and culture and general Americana decoration throughout the main hall.

Admission to Freedom Plane is free to the public, but separate from general admission to the museum. Space is limited, and passes are available on a first-come, first-serve basis. Non-members should expect long waits or the possibility that the day's passes are sold out. Only museum members can reserve passes for specific times. Flash photography is prohibited due to the fragile nature of the documents.

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This article originally appeared on CultureMap.com.

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