Houston student startup competition doles out record-breaking more than $3M in prizes

show me the money

Seventeen of the RBPC student teams walked away with investment prizes this year. Photo courtesy of Rice

Over the weekend, Houston hosted what is known as the world’s largest and richest intercollegiate student startup competition, and a Texas team took the overall win and over $3 million in investment prizes were given out at the annual banquet.

The 2023 Rice Business Plan Competition was held May 11-13 and included mentoring, pitching, and networking for the 42 student teams with over 350 judges before culminating in over 80 prizes being announced. The $3.4 million in investment and in-kind prizes marks the largest yet for the 23-year-old competition.

"Judges told us that the quality of the startups at this year’s competition was the best ever,” says Catherine Santamaria, director of the RBPC, in the news release. “One judge went so far as to say that every startup this year was worthy of investment.”

Over 450 startups applied to the competition, and the 42 startups selected hailed from 35 universities from five countries. There were five categories: energy, clean tech and sustainability; life sciences and health care solutions; consumer products and services; hard tech; and digital enterprise. Based on the judges scores, seven startups reached the finals, and this year, three Texas teams made the finals, with two being from Rice University.

All 42 companies were eligible for investment or in-kind prizes, and, even though $1.75 million in prizes was expected to be awarded, some of this year's investors doubled — or even tripled — down on investment awards. While the finalists walked away with various in-kind prizes too, here's a round up of the investment prizes each startup won at the awards.

Zaymo, Brigham Young University — $885,000

Zaymo, a tool for e-commerce brands that embeds the shopping experience within customers’ email, won the most amount of money at the awards ceremony. The company won third place and a $50,000 Investment Prize sponsored by David Anderson, Jon Finger, Anderson Family Fund, Finger Interests, Greg Novak and Tracy Druce. Zaymo also won the following awards:

$200,000 OWL Investment Prize
$100,000 Houston Angel Network Investment Prize
$500,000 Softeq Venture Fund Prize
$15,000 Eagle Investors Prize
$20,000 Novak Druce Carroll Investment Prize

Boston Quantum, Massachusetts Institute of Technology — $455,000

Boston Quantum, which is using enterprise quantum computing software to disrupt the financial industry, won the second-most amount of investment prizes and sixth place in the competition.

$5,000 Chevron Technology Ventures Sixth-Place Cash Prize
$300,000 OWL Investment Prize
$125,000 Softeq Venture Fund Prize
$25,000 Urban Capital Network Diversity Investment Prize in partnership with South Loop Ventures

FluxWorks, Texas A&M University — $350,000

Based on the judges scores, the big winner was FluxWorks, a Texas company that's technology includes magnetic gears that are four times quieter than standard with 99 percent efficiency and can offer unprecedented reliability from outer space to under the sea and even inside the human body. The company won the $350,000 GOOSE Capital Investment Grand Prize.

Skali, Northwestern University — $300,000

Skali, which didn't make it into the prestigious finalist positions, still walked away with $300,000 courtesy of the Softeq Venture Fund Prize. Skali's technology aims to better equip flights with medical emergency assistance.

TierraClimate, Rice University — $280,000

TierraClimate, a marketplace for selling verified carbon offsets to corporate buyers, won fourth place and the Norton Rose Fulbright $5,000 Prize. The company also won a $200,000 Softeq Venture Fund Prize and the $75,000 OWL Investment Prize.

AirSeal, Washington University in St. Louis — $250,000

Another non-finalist that still scored big was AirSeal, a company that's created a simple blood test for cardiovascular diagnostics. The startup secured the $250,000 TMC Innovation Healthcare Investment Prize.

Sygne Solutions, Rice University — $200,000

Sygne Solutions, a startup on a mission of eliminating a group of chemicals known as PFAS in water through its patent-pending technology, won second place and the $100,000 Investment Prize, sponsored by David Anderson, Jon Finger, Anderson Family Fund, Finger Interests, Greg Novak and Tracy Druce. The company also received the $100,000 TiE Houston Angels Investment Prize.

BlueVerse, Texas Tech University — $145,000

BlueVerse, a startup with tech to merge social media with reviews and rewards for small businesses, didn't make the finals but walked away with on of the $125,000 Softeq Venture Fund Prizes and the $20,000 Novak Druce Carroll Investment Prize.

Atma Leather, Yale University —$130,000

Atma Leather, a material innovation company that's created plant-based leather from banana stems and other crop waste, came in fifth place and secured the $5,000 EY Fifth-Place Cash Prize. The startup also won:

$75,000 OWL Investment Prizes
$50,000 nCourage Investment Group’s Courageous Women Entrepreneurs Investment Prize

MyLÚA Health, Cornell University — $30,000

MyLÚA Health's AI technology supports the maternal health industry. The company won the $30,000 Pearland Economic Development Corporation Spirit of Entrepreneurship Prize.

Active Surfaces, Massachusetts Institute of Technology — $25,000

With its flexible and lightweight solar panel technology, Active Surfaces scored the $25,000 New Climate Ventures Sustainability Investment Prize.

Integrated Molecular Innovations, Michigan Technological University — $25,000

Integrated Molecular Innovations, which created a wearable device that can monitor hormone levels, won the $25,000 Southwest National Pediatric Device Consortium Prize.

MiraHeart, Johns Hopkins University — $25,000

MiraHeart, which created a non-invasive way of monitoring child heart conditions, also won the $25,000 Southwest National Pediatric Device Consortium Prize.

Biome Future, University of Florida — $20,000

Biome Future, which creates ocean-safe chemicals via microbes in corals, won one of the $20,000 Novak Druce Carroll Investment Prizes.

Citrimer, University of Michigan — $10,000

A sustainable materials company, Citrimer won the $10,000 NABACO RBPC Alumni Network Prize.

Thryft Ship, University of Georgia — $10,000

Thryft Ship, which streamlines the shipping process for social media sellers, won a $10,000 nCourage Investment Group’s Courageous Women Entrepreneurs Investment Prize.

Pathways, Harvard University — $5,000

Pathways, which is developing a full-stack sustainability platform for the construction industry, won $5,000 Shell Ventures Seventh-Place Cash Prize.

In addition to these investment prizes, the startups have the chance to score in-kind prizes. This year, that included:

$6,667 Baker Botts Legal Services In-Kind Prize to FluxWorks, Texas A&M University
$6,667 Baker Botts Legal Services In-Kind Prize to Sygne Solutions, Rice University
$6,667 Baker Botts Legal Services In-Kind PrizeFluxWorks to Zaymo, Brigham Young University
$10,000 New York Technology Capital CFO Consulting In-Kind to FluxWorks, Texas A&M University
EFN Mentoring Services to all startup competitors
Amazon Web Services to all startup competitors
Stage 2 Competition Entry to Sygne Solutions, Rice University

All 42 of the RBPC companies wins at least $950. In each of the three semi-final rounds, third place wins $2,000, fourth place wins $1,750, and fifth place wins $1,500. The wild card round, which acts as a second-chance competition for the companies that didn't originally make it to the finals, advances the wild card winner into the finals and also awards second place $1,000, third place $975, fourth place $950, and fifth place $950.

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Elon Musk's SpaceX is about to make its debut on Wall Street

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Elon Musk's rocket company SpaceX will make its debut on Wall Street Friday, June 12, and both institutional and retail investors are expected to gobble up the 555.6 million shares going up for sale at $135 apiece. Musk, already the world's richest man, could become its first trillionaire.

SpaceX is likely to become the biggest IPO ever, with proceeds of around $75 billion. SpaceX hopes to become the first company to send people to Mars. In fact, part of Musk’s future compensation depends on SpaceX eventually establishing a colony of at least 1 million people on the red planet.

Why SpaceX is going public now

In a video conference on Musk's social media platform X, he told JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon that people have suggested for the last 10 years that he take SpaceX public. He's doing it now because the company plans to put 100,000 next-generation Starlink satellites into orbit. Deploying AI data centers in space is a “massive new growth base and you need capital for that,” he said.

Going public provides access to the capital that SpaceX needs. But it also exposes it to more scrutiny from shareholders and more regulatory oversight. That includes filing quarterly financial reports, which critics say incentivizes short-term thinking over longer-term planning and creates unnecessary costs for a company. Securities regulators are currently soliciting public comment on a proposal to require public companies to file the financial reports only twice every year.

How the IPO impacts the company

Musk will hold the majority of a special class of shares, giving him control over decisions related to company strategy, finances and personnel. On the latter, because of his ownership of most of these Class B shares, the only person who can fire Musk as CEO is Musk.

The company credits Musk with being the “driving force” behind its growth, innovation and success. But what happens if Musk is no longer in the picture? SpaceX warns that the loss of Musk could disrupt its ability to execute its strategy as well as hurt its “reputation and relationships with customers, partners and other stakeholders.”

The company also warns that finding a replacement with the same skills and experience as Musk would be time-consuming, if not nearly impossible. As Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives wrote Wednesday, “At the end of the day Musk is SpaceX and SpaceX is Musk.”

What could make or break SpaceX

Currently in the test phase, the gigantic reusable Starship rocket is key to SpaceX realizing Musk's ambitions. Much of the commercial space business hinges on SpaceX developing Starship’s capability to be fully reusable and hearty enough for a quick turnaround between flights. If that doesn't happen, SpaceX warns that putting data centers and satellites in space will take longer and cost more money, meaning it risks customers bailing on the company.

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The prospectus filed last week says SpaceX’s biggest potential market is the sale of business-oriented artificial intelligence products designed to transform how people get work done. It’s an opportunity SpaceX predicts would be worth $22.7 trillion if it could somehow dominate rivals like Anthropic, OpenAI and Microsoft in a highly competitive industry. But the prospectus shows no clear path to profitability for the xAI business, which merged with SpaceX earlier this year.

Why Wall Street is paying attention

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The announcement came two months after Artemis II's record-breaking trip around the moon that surpassed the distance record of Apollo 13.

NASA's Randy Bresnik, Frank Rubio, Andre Douglas and the European Space Agency's Luca Parmitano won't fly to the moon or land on the surface. Instead, they’ll orbit Earth while practicing docking their Orion capsule with two lunar landers.

“To the Artemis III crew, we wish you Godspeed on the journey ahead,” said NASA administrator Jared Isaacman.

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NASA's Artemis program aims to return astronauts to the moon's surface for the first time since the 1970s. A recent revamp of the program announced by Isaacman aims to fast-track it similarly to the Apollo era, adding the upcoming spaceflight around Earth before eyeing a lunar landing in 2028.

“We are certainly humbled as a crew to be able to be your crew that executes this Artemis III mission in space,” said Bresnik, Artemis III commander.

Added Douglas, mission specialist: “My brain — it is going a mile a minute right now. But my heart, it is so warm. It is so full."

In May, NASA awarded hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts to four companies, including Blue Origin, to build landers, rovers and drones for a future moon base. Isaacman said the goal of the moon base is to lay the foundation for a Mars expedition.

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