Houston organization plans to launch health tech accelerator in 2022

ready to grow

Proxima Clinical Research has its New Year's resolution and is ready to start working hands on with health tech startups. Graphic via proximacro.com

A contract research organization based in Houston has announced its new accelerator program aimed at helping startups quickly grow their health tech businesses.

Proxima Clinical Research released details of M1 MedTech, which expects to launch early next year. The CRO has raised funds to launch and invest in members of the inaugural cohort.

“Our goal is to move these companies substantially forward in a short amount of time,” says Kevin Coker, CEO of Proxima, in a news release. “Proxima is in a unique position to leverage our experienced team of regulatory, quality, and clinical experts. We won’t be working at arm’s length from these companies. We will be a big part of what they do every day.”

The program will focus on a small group of companies and the Proxima team will provide hands-on support, including instruction, workshops, and one-on-one mentoring.

“This will be a unique experience for all parties involved, as Proxima is also a young, yet established, company that is now creating a program to assist companies at an earlier stage,” says Larry Lawson, co-founder of Proxima, in the release. “Our experience in the CRO realm and ability to provide coaching in clinical, regulatory, quality, and go-to-market strategies will only strengthen M1 MedTech’s ability to support the success of emerging companies and provide more life-saving technology to the public.”

Kevin Coker and Larry Lawson co-founded Proxima in 2017. Photos courtesy

The accelerator will target Class II and III medical devices for its initial cohort. In the future, Proxima plans to expand to include an even more extensive incubator focused solely on Class III devices, according to the release.

“M1 will be a place where startups can go to receive concrete resources to further their development. The participant success is our sole focus, and the ultimate goal is to have a substantial impact on the ideation-to-market process for Class II and Class III medical devices,” says Isabella Schmitt, director of regulatory affairs at Proxima and a principal at M1, in the release. “Proxima’s specific expertise alongside our M1 partners will provide resources for all key areas of a medical device entrepreneur’s journey to market and beyond.”

The M1 MedTech applications will open online in the spring.

“We don’t view M1 as competitive to other accelerators, rather we believe it will offer a different experience. Our team will strive to create a personalized program where companies have a dedicated touch point throughout the process,” says Sean Bittner, director of programs at M1 MedTech, in the release. “We will also provide specific, tailored connections and resources vetted by our team through professional partnerships, not just a general list of industry contacts.”

This week's roundup of Houston innovators includes Stephanie Campbell of HAN and The Artemis Fund, Larry Lawson of Proxima Clinical Research, and Vanessa Wyche of the Johnson Space Center. Courtesy photos

3 Houston innovators to know this week

who's who

Editor's note: In this week's roundup of Houston innovators to know, I'm introducing you to three local innovators across industries — from medical device development to fintech — recently making headlines in Houston innovation.

Stephanie Campbell, managing director of the Houston Angel Network and general partner at The Artemis Fund

Local investment leader talks trends in Houston venture capital activity

Stephanie Campbell joins the Houston Innovators Podcast last week to share some trends in early-stage investing. Photo courtesy of HAN

There were so many question marks at the beginning of the pandemic, especially for startup funding. Stephanie Campbell, who manages the most active angel network as well as a venture capital fund, says no one was sure how anything was going to pan out. Now, looking back on last year, VC did ok, she says on the Houston Innovators Podcast, and the Houston Angel Network saw membership growth.

"I think that given the markets with quite a bit of liquidity, people were looking for new and interesting ways to invest and make a return," Campbell says on the podcast. "In 2020, we actually grew by 30 percent and are up to 130 members of the Houston Angel Network and are continuing to grow through 2021."

Campbell shares more of her observations on the show and what she's focused on next. Click here to read more and stream the episode.

Larry Lawson, co-founder of Proxima Clinical Research

Larry Lawson joined InnovationMap for a Q&A about his startup's recent exit, his role on the boards of five med device companies, his investment activity, and more. Photo courtesy of Larry Lawson

When Larry Lawson started his career in the medical device industry, it was hard to get funding. The health tech founder and investor says if it wasn't oil or real estate, banks couldn't understand well enough to make a loan. So, he bootstrapped, raised from friends and family, and found venture capital support for his business endeavors over the years. Now, he's celebrating a $1.4 billion exit of his last business, Preventice Solutions, a deal that closed earlier this year.

The ecosystem in Houston has changed, he says, and he's seen it evolve as the Texas Medical Center grew and the Rice Business Plan Competition brought impressive student innovators from all around the globe.

"The health science community here in Houston is now known all over the world," he tells InnovationMap. "It's gonna just continue to grow and develop, and I hope to be a part of continue to be a part of it." Click here to read more.

Vanessa Wyche, director of Johnson Space Center

Vanessa Wyche is the first Black woman to lead a NASA center. Photo courtesy of NASA

For the first time, NASA has a Black woman at the helm of a space center. Vanessa Wyche has been named director of Johnson Space Center in Houston after serving as acting director since May 3.

"Vanessa is a tenacious leader who has broken down barriers throughout her career," Pam Melroy, deputy administrator of NASA, says in a news release. "Vanessa's more than three decades at NASA and program experience in almost all of the human spaceflight programs at Johnson is an incredible asset to the agency. In the years to come, I'm confident that Houston will continue to lead the way in human spaceflight."

As director of Johnson Space Center, Wyche now leads more than 10,000 NASA employees and contractors. Click here to read more.

Larry Lawson joined InnovationMap for a Q&A about his startup's recent exit, his role on the boards of five med device companies, his investment activity, and more. Photo courtesy of Larry Lawson

Fresh off a $1.4B exit, this Houston innovator is focused on funding medical device tech

Q&A

Earlier this year, Houston-based serial entrepreneur Larry Lawson celebrated the exit of his medical device company, Preventice Solutions, which he sold to Boston ScientificBoston Scientific in a $1.4 billion deal.

Nowadays, Lawson is laser focused on investing in the Houston innovation ecosystem, particularly in medical device, as well as working on Proxima Clinical Research, a contract research organization in the Texas Medical Center he co-founded with Kevin Coker.

Lawson joined InnovationMap for a Q&A about the exit, his role on the boards of five med device companies, and his investment activity. He also shares how he sees the impact of COVID-19 and where Houston's burgeoning innovation ecosystem is headed.

InnovationMap: Earlier this year you saw an exit for your company Preventice Solutions, a company focused on the development of mobile health solutions and remote monitoring, which was sold to Boston Scientific in a $1.4 billion deal. What did this deal mean to both you and the company?

Larry Lawson: It validated what I started back in 2004. I had an idea, And I moved forward on my idea — in the beginning completely financed that idea myself. I tried to raise funds, and it was very difficult here in Houston back in 2004 to do that. I put my money, you might say, where my mouth was and I started the company and funded it and built it to a point to where we attracted some venture capital from one of the world's largest VC groups out of California called Sequoia Capital. That allowed me to really increase our exposure and our footprint nationally. And it just grew and grew and eventually Boston scientific got interested in the company, along with Merck, a pharmaceutical company, and they bought smaller pieces of the company.

Then at the end of the year of 2020, Boston Scientific made a play to acquire the company completely. Frankly, it have been better. I would have never dreamt that my original company would be worth that much and sell for that much. So it was very nice for not only me, but for many other people that were employed by Preventice, because as a founder of the company, I knew how important it was to share equity with the people that really make the company run and make it run well.

IM: I noticed that you’re on the board of several Houston health tech startups — most of which I’ve covered on InnovationMap. What do you look for in a company before joining the board and what role do you play for the companies’ growth?

LL: First of all, I look at the people who are in the company — from top level executive level all the way down, even including the existing board members of the company. I only invest in medical device companies. That's what I know, and that's why I've spent over 50 years in, and I feel like I know it very well. I do not venture far off of that line or that path at all.

I look for a strong operating group. I look for strong leadership — and if I can bring even stronger leadership and have them get from point A to point B, I like to get involved. Given my medical as the chairman of the company.

IM: You started your investment firm in 2018 — what inspired you to create LAWALA Capital and what do you look for in potential portfolio companies?

LL: I really limit my investments to the medical device segment of health care. LAWALA is just me — it's the first two letters of all three of my names: Larry Wayne Lawson. How I got into investing and starting companies is I see opportunity, and I see voids in the industry.

IM: Speaking of, you founded Proxima Clinical Research in 2017, which has a very hands-on approach to accelerating health tech innovation. Why did you decide to start that up?

LL: I saw a void in the clinical research industry, specifically at the medical center here, the largest medical center on the face of the earth. And it was doing all of this attracting all of these companies, all of these health science companies into Houston, and they were building and budding their companies, but there was no centralized clinical research company to be there for them.

I thought, "my gosh, somebody ought to do this." Well, I'm a doer. So, I went to the powers to be at the medical center and got their approval to be the founder of a company, called Proxima Clinical Research, and the key is putting it right there in the heart of the largest medical center in the world.

It's been really, really good for these companies who are coming into Houston to take advantage of the life science growth that's taking place here in Houston.

IM: How did COVID-19 affect the work that you do?

LL: COVID really did not affect our business that greatly. It affected the investments that I was doing. I pulled back and cut my, expenses and that, because I just needed to see, you know, how the COVID thing would shake out. I'm watching my investments a lot closer today, and think that it's affected the startup companies, more because to be a startup company, you have to go out and find investors to invest in your company. And I think that process has been slowed, I won't say considerably, but I think it's been slowed quite a bit over the past year and a half.

It just so happens that in the industry that I've been in, which is patient monitoring — cardiac arrhythmia monitoring — COVID has heightened patient monitoring more than anything else. What we learned from COVID is that we've got to be more in tune ourselves than ever before in monitoring all aspects of ourselves. What has come out of this COVID pandemic is telemedicine, which has struggled for years, now all of a sudden telemedicine is on the tip of everyone's tongue.

And I think that's one reason why you see the big companies — the multinational, multi-billion dollar companies — getting more in patient monitoring.

IM: Houston is home to the largest medical center in the world — but it’s often times not listed as a top city for medical innovation. Is that changing? And if so, how?

LL: When the medical center purchased the old Nabisco building and turned that into a technology center and a startup center, it changed the whole complexion of the device and medical startup community here in Houston. We've had a lot of former development here through MD Anderson in oncology, but we'd never had very much in devices. Now, we have companies coming from Europe and Asia coming to Houston to promote their technology and the devices that they have built.

The Rice Business Plan Competition is the largest in the United States. We fund more startup companies out of RBPC. I'm talking Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Berkeley — Houston is number one. And that has a lot to do with what has happened in the medical center over the past seven or eight years.

IM: What more do we need, now that we've come this far to really push us into that innovative healthcare city status?

LL: Well, I think what we need is for investors investing in healthcare and not oil and dirt. For years and years, the whole economy was driven by oil and gas and real estate. And I can remember starting my first company, the early eighties, I went to banks to borrow money to start my first company, and all I wanted was $200,000. Well, that was still a lot of money back then, but they would literally fall asleep on me because they couldn't understand and didn't understand exactly what I wanted to do. And so I wound up having to fund myself use my friends and family as investors, but that's changed quite a bit. The health science community here in Houston is now known all over the world. It's gonna just continue to grow and develop, and I hope to be a part of continue to be a part of it.

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This conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity.

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UH med school granted $2M gift to offer student scholarships

scholarship gift

A new scholarship endowment aims to support students in the University of Houston’s recently established medical school.

The University of Houston’s Tilman J. Fertitta Family College of Medicine received a planned estate gift commitment estimated at $2.1 million to establish the Bob Diehl and Teresa Evans Diehl Scholarship Endowment. The scholarship will assist full-time medical students who demonstrate financial need and meet academic standards.

“Endowed scholarships like this do more than ease the burden of tuition—they empower our students to focus on learning, leadership and compassionate care,” Jonathan McCullers, UH vice president of health affairs and dean of the Fertitta College of Medicine, said in a news release. “We are deeply grateful to the Diehls for their vision and commitment to expanding access to health care through education.”

The endowment aims to provide annual scholarship support for students enrolled in the Fertitta College of Medicine. The gift also aligns with the university's fundraising initiative focused on expanding opportunities for students, known as Can’t Stop Houston: The Centennial Campaign, which works to expand research ahead of UH’s 100th anniversary next year.

The Diehls are both graduates from UH, and Bob Diehl spent 38 years working at UPS.

“It brings me happiness to know that my endowment will make a difference in young people's lives and in the communities that will need those future doctors,” he said in the release.

The Fertitta College of Medicine welcomed its inaugural class of 30 students in 2020 and expects classes to grow to 120 students in the coming years, according to UH. The university believes scholarship opportunities will be crucial for students to pursue medical education despite financial challenges.

“The Diehl family’s generosity will open doors for talented future physicians who are called to serve our communities but may otherwise face financial barriers to pursuing a medical education,” McCullers added.

9 Houston universities boast best grad programs of 2026, per U.S. News

making the grade

Nine Houston-area universities are earning new national acclaim in a report of the best graduate schools in the U.S. for 2026.

U.S. News & World Report annually publishes its national "Best Graduate Schools" rankings in early April, which comprehensively rank graduate programs across business, education, engineering, law, health, and many others.

New for the 2026 edition, the publication updated its rankings across 12 health disciplines — only physician assistant and social work were excluded — and "the first full refresh" of doctoral science programs since 2022. U.S. News also revived its Master's in Fine Arts rankings for the first time since 2020.

"We know a graduate degree is a major commitment,” said LaMont Jones, Ed.D., managing editor of Education at U.S. News. “That is why we are dedicated to methodologies that thoroughly examine a wide range of factors, from research excellence to career success. These rankings are a powerful tool for prospective students, offering clarity and confidence as they approach their most critical educational choice."

This is how the nine local schools ranked, statewide and nationally, and how they compared with last year's national ranking:

Rice University

  • Brown School of Engineering – No. 3 best graduate engineering school in Texas; No. 25 nationally (up from No. 26 last year)
  • Jones Graduate School of Business – No. 3 best business school in Texas; No. 29 nationally (unchanged)

Several of Rice’s doctoral science programs were among the 30 best in the country, including earth sciences (No. 20), chemistry (No. 22), biostatistics (No. 25), mathematics (No. 26), statistics (No. 27), and physics (No. 28). The Ph.D. biological sciences program tied as 55th best nationwide. Rice’s public affairs program tied for No. 107 nationally.

University of Houston

  • Cullen College of Engineering – No. 5 best graduate engineering school in Texas; tied for No. 71 nationally (up from No. 72 last year)
  • College of Education – No. 5 best graduate education school in Texas; No. 95 nationally (down from No. 81 last year)
  • UH Law Center – No. 5 best law school in Texas; No. 54 nationally (up from No. 63 last year)

The University of Houston has the 31st best pharmacy program in the country, its speech-language pathology program tied for No. 54 nationally, and the clinical psychology program tied as 65th best in the U.S. In the doctoral sciences rankings, UH’s earth sciences program ranked No. 80 nationally, the physics program tied for No. 81, the chemistry program ranked 84th, and the mathematics program ranked No. 87. The Ph.D. biological sciences program ranked as the 104th best in the nation. UH’s public affairs program tied as 80th best nationally. The university also has the 106th best fine arts program in the nation.

University of Houston, Clear Lake

  • College of Education – No. 12 best graduate education school in Texas; No. 164 nationally (up from No. 166 last year)

University of Texas Health Science Center (UT Health Houston)

  • Cizik School of Nursing – No. 2 best master’s in nursing program in Texas; No. 32 nationally (up from No. 41 last year)
  • McGovern Medical School – Tier 2 best research medical school in the U.S.

UT Health Houston’s public health program tied for No. 31 nationwide, and the health care management program tied for No. 47. The Cizik School of Nursing’s nurse anesthesia program tied as 49th best in the country. In the doctoral sciences rankings, the university’s biostatistics program tied as the 25th best nationwide.

University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston

  • Sealy School of Medicine – Tier 2 best medical research school in the U.S.

UT Medical Branch’s occupational therapy program tied for No. 41 nationally, the physical therapy program tied for No. 57, and the university tied for the 60th best nurse anesthesia program in the U.S. The public health program tied for No. 89 nationally. In the doctoral sciences rankings, the university’s biostatistics program tied for No. 70 nationally.

Prairie View A&M University

  • College of Nursing – No. 5 best master’s in nursing program in Texas; No. 104 nationally (unchanged)

South Texas College of Law Houston

  • No. 7 best law school in Texas; No. 128 nationally (up from No. 138 last year)

Texas Southern University

  • College of Education – No. 17 best graduate education school in Texas; No. 219 nationally (down from No. 178-195 last year)

TSU’s pharmacy program tied for No. 120 nationally.

University of Texas MD Anderson
UT MD Anderson’s doctoral biostatistics program tied as the 17th best nationally, and the doctoral biological sciences program tied for No. 50.

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This article originally appeared on CultureMap.com.

Houston medtech firm secures $30M for neurosurgical robot

stroke surgery

Robotic neurosurgery is an exciting new frontier in medicine, and Houston-based medtech firm XCath is leading the charge with its revolutionary Iris robotic system. The company announced in March that it had secured $30 million in Series C funding to continue developing systems to tackle blood clots in the human brain.

“We are grateful to our investors for their conviction in our shared mission to improve clinical outcomes for patients impacted by endovascular diseases,” Eduardo Fonseca, CEO of XCath, said in a news release. “In 2025, the XCath team advanced the frontiers of endovascular robotics. This funding accelerates our commitment to expanding access to life-saving care so that where a patient lives no longer determines whether they live.”

XCath–which also has campuses in Pangyo, South Korea–has already achieved a number of remarkable firsts in robotic neurosurgery. The Iris is the only endovascular robotic system currently in development to perform intracranial navigation or neurointerventional treatment, and is the only robot in the world to have performed an intracranial neurovascular procedure involving the robotic manipulation of three devices.

These new Series C funds, which bring the company's total investment to $92 million, will go toward developing a clinical telerobot capable of performing a mechanical thrombectomy. This would bring unprecedented accuracy and precision to the surgical removal of brain clots, significantly reducing the risk of neurosurgery.

“Robotic surgery succeeds when innovation is paired with practical execution,” Dr. Fred Moll, chairman of the XCath board of directors, said in the release. “XCath has built a promising technology foundation, and just as importantly, a team that values rigor and appreciates perspective. I’m excited to support them as they take on the mission of globalizing access to gold-standard care for stroke patients.”

In November 2025, the Iris debuted under the control of Dr. Vitor Mendes Pereira at The Panama Clinic in Panama City, alongside local Principal Investigator Dr. Anastasio Ameijeiras Sibauste. It was only the second time in human history that a robot had been used for intracranial neurovascular intervention, and it established Iris as a viable technology in the fight against stroke.

“Treatment of stroke and other neurovascular diseases represents one of the most significant financial opportunities in healthcare, supported by positive reimbursement dynamics and strong demand from health systems,” Nicholas Drysdale, CFO of XCath, added in the release. “With our continued investor support and disciplined capital deployment, XCath is positioned to build a category-leading platform in endovascular robotics”.

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