Photos: Houston innovation leaders weigh in on cybersecurity, tech, and more at inaugural event

total knock out

The Digital Fight Club made its Houston debut on November 20 at White Oak Music Hall. Emily Jaschke/InnovationMap

What do you get when you cross the information of an innovation panel with the ferocity of a boxing match? A verbal sprawling among innovation leaders that can only be known as the Digital Fight Club.

Houston's DFC came about with the help of Accenture, which had been a partner at the Dallas events, and InnovationMap, who teamed up as presenting sponsors for the event. DFC's founder, Michael Pratt, came up with the idea for Digital Fight Club as a way to liven up technology-focused events and networking opportunities.

The setup of the event is five fights, 10 fighters, and five judges. Each fighter has just a couple minutes to take their stand before the event moves on.

"This is Digital Fight Club," says Pratt, CEO of the company. "You get subject matter experts, and serious founders and CEOs on the stage and make them make their case. You learn something, it's a lot of fun, and it's a lot better than a panel."

The hour of fighting is coupled with a VIP event ahead of the showdown and an after party where further networking can continue on. At Houston's VIP event, InnovationMap got to check in with partners, fighters, and referees about how they thought the event was going to pan out. Check out the VIP event video here.

The panel of referees included Gabriella Rowe, CEO of Station Houston; Denise Hamilton, CEO of Watch Her Work; Tim Kopra, partner at Blue Bear Capital; Lance Black, Director at TMCx; and Barbara Burger, president of Chevron Technology Ventures.

The refs asked two questions per fight, and were able to vote on the winners of each round — as was the audience through an interactive web-based application. The break down of the fights, topics, and winners are as follows:

Fight #1: Future Workforce of Robotics/AI. Matt Hager, CEO of Poetic Systems, vs Pablo Marin, senior AI Leader, Microsoft. Hager took the win with 77 percent of the vote.
Fight #2: Whose responsibility is cybersecurity. Ted Gutierrez, CEO of SecurityGate vs Tara Khanna, managing director and Security Lead at Accenture. Khanna won this round, snagging 66 percent of the votes.
Fight #3: Oil & Gas Industry and the Environment. Michael Szafron - commercial adviser for Cemvita Factory, vs Steven Taylor, co-founder of AR for Everyone. Szafron received 76 percent of the voites, securing the win.
Fight #4: Digital in our personal lives. Grace Rodriguez, CEO of ImpactHub, vs Javier Fadul, chief innovation officer at HTX Labs. Rodriguez won with the largest margin of the night — 85 percent.
Fight #5: Future of Primary Care Geetinder Goyal, CEO of First Primary Care, vs Nick Desai, chief medical information officer at Houston Methodist. Goyal received 72 percent of the votes to take home the win.

The fights were heated, and some of the fighters had knockout quotes, from Hager's "AI is mostly bullshit" to Khanna's "Compliance doesn't mean you're secure." For more of the knockout quotes, click here.

The fight is on

Emily Jaschke/InnovationMap

Mike Pratt, who hosted the event, founded the Digital Fight Club in 2016.

Ten Houston innovators took the stage for five fights on the role technology plays in the future of industry. Emily Jaschke/InnovationMap

Overheard: Local fighters land knockout statements at Houston's first Digital Fight Club

Eavesdropping in houston

On Wednesday, Houston's innovation ecosystem hosted the rowdiest crowd at a professional business event that the city has ever seen.

Digital Fight Club, a Dallas-based event company, had its first Houston event at White Oak Music Hall on November 20 thanks to presenting sponsors Accenture and InnovationMap. The event featured 10 fighters and five referees across five fights that discussed cybersecurity, the future of primary care, and more.

"This is Digital Fight Club," says Michael Pratt, CEO of the company. "You get subject matter experts, and serious founders and CEOs on the stage and make them make their case. You learn something, it's a lot of fun, and it's a lot better than a panel."

If you missed the showdown, here are some of the nights zingers made by the entrepreneurs and subject matter experts that were the fighters of the evening.

"I believe that computers can get a lot of information to create [something new]. That's my job, that's what I do, and I see it done."

— Pablo Marin, senior AI leader at Microsoft, during the fight on robotics and AI in the workforce. Marin's argument was that artificial intelligence and robotics can and will replace all repetitive jobs. However, he also believes that computers have the ability to create, as well, based on their ability to see the whole world and have access to all the world's information.

"AI is mostly bullshit."

— Matthew Hager, CEO of Poetic Systems. Hager, who won the first fight of the night, responded to Marin that, while businesses like to believe that AI is actually able to deliver results so that they can sell more, the technology hasn't actually arrived yet. Plus, Hager says AI will never be creative without the human element. "Creativity is about who created it. It's about the photographer, not the camera," he says.

"What if the seatbelt laws and the speed limits were defined by Dodge, Ford, or Chrysler?"

— Ted Gutierrez, CEO and co-founder of Security Gate, who argued for government to take the reigns of cybersecurity. He adds that companies are never going to be able to agree to one set of rules. "We gotta get one group to set the standard, and it's up to everyone else to refine that and innovate for it," he says.

"Compliance doesn't mean you're secure."

— Tara Khanna, managing director and security lead at Accenture, who won the fight on cybersecurity needing to be figured out by the business industry. She argues that the private sector wins the war on talent and recruiting, so it has the money and resources to dedicate to the issue in more ways than the government ever will.

"I was born, I'm going to die, and there is nothing like earth in the universe as we know it. It is worth preserving and protecting."

— Steven Taylor, co-founder of AR for Everyone, in the fight over the oil and gas industry's responsibility to the environment. He argued that it's going to be a mix of policy and corporate initiatives that changes the industry.

"I think the free market is going to get there if the consumer has the choice to pick what they want to do."

— Michael Szafron, commercial adviser for Cemvita Factory, who took home the win for the oil and gas and the environment fight. Szafron's argument was that corporations are going to do what their consumers want, so that's who would drive them to action. "Let's look at California —very regulated environmentalists, and a million of those people get moved to Texas," he says.

"Disconnecting our personal lives from technology would not only limit ourselves, but it would also limit our capacity to adopt those tools to the needs of our society."

— Javier Fadul, chief innovation officer at HTX Labs, during the fight on digital in our personal lives. Fadul argues that not only does technology allow us to connect worldwide, but disconnecting would prevent that technology from developing further.

"I love tech, but now that it's on all the time everywhere, we need to make time to unplug."

— Grace Rodriguez, CEO of Impact Hub Houston, who won the fight on personal technology. She says that yes, technology can help international connectivity, but it does more harm than good as people use personal tech as a default or distraction from humans right in front of them. "When your with people, be present," she says.

"Part of our innovation to redesign primary care is really to deploy technology out there to seamlessly provide care."

— Nick Desai, chief medical information officer at Houston Methodist, who argued that the future of primary care is new innovations within traditional medicine. He adds that virtual care, which is something Methodist is working on, can help improve accessibility.

"The future of primary care is here. It's called direct primary care."

— Geetinder Goyal, CEO of First Primary Care, who won the fight on the future of primary care with his argument for a new, free market approach to medicine. Direct primary care opens up treatment and access to physicians with a monthly fee for patients to work outside of health care plans.

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Houston e-commerce giant Cart.com launches government-focused subsidiary

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Houston e-commerce and logistics unicorn Cart.com has launched a new subsidiary.

Cart Government Solutions (CGS), which was announced earlier this week, will provide supply chain and logistics services and software for the federal and state government sectors. The new subsidiary will be headquartered in Washington, D.C., and operate out of about 6 million square feet of secure warehouse space across 14 U.S. facilities, according to a news release from Cart.com. It will support both domestic and overseas logistics.

Industry veteran Gregg Zegras will lead the new entity as president. Zegras previously served as Cart.com's chief revenue officer, according to LinkedIn. Before that, he served as president of Connecticut-based Pitney Bowes Global eCommerce, a digital shipping solutions company.

Remington Tonar, Cart.com's co-founder, will serve as CGS's chief innovation officer.

“Government agencies face procurement and logistics challenges that many commercial platforms simply weren’t built to solve,” Zegras said in the news release. “Cart Government Solutions exists to change that. We’re combining the speed and innovation of a technology company with the compliance rigor, security, and operational depth that federal and state customers require, and we’re doing it with a team that has spent careers working alongside and inside these agencies.”

According to the company, CGS will focus on meeting compliance and security requirements in the public sector. Some of the services the new entity will offer include:

Inventory management
Cold-chain and specialty storage for pharmaceuticals, medical devices and regulated goods
Enterprise-grade supply chain software
Government-compliant webstores and online ordering portals
Cybersecurity operations

Cart.com has been serving the public sector since 2022, when the company began distributing COVID-19 health supplies nationwide, according to the news release. Through that pandemic-era contract, the company reports it moved more than 725 million units, with an average of under two days per shipment.

Cart.com was founded in Houston in 2020, though it briefly moved its headquarters to Austin. The company reached unicorn status with its $60 million Series C raise in 2023. It most recently raised $180 million in growth capital from private equity firm Springcoast Partners in March, which put the startup over the $1 billion in fundraising mark in just six years.

At the time, Cart.com said it planned to scale its logistics network, expand AI capabilities and develop workflow automation tools.

Houston-based KBR Inc. also recently launched a government services spinoff. Read more here.

2 Houston universities named best colleges of 2027 by Princeton Review

A-Plus Ratings

Back-to-school season is has returned in full force, and that means it's time for college rankings. Two Houston universities in particular are being hailed as the top of the class for 2027.

The high caliber schools — Rice University and University of Houston — earned new acclaim in The Princeton Review's ranking of the "Best 392 Colleges" for 2027.

The Princeton Review's 35th annual "Best Colleges" rankings are determined by a survey of 172,000 current college students that gave "candid feedback" about their schools and their experiences. The flagship guide does not rank the schools overall, but it does rank them across 50 different categories, including best-run colleges, best quality of life, happiest students, best athletic facilities, among others.

In all, 14 Texas institutions were highlighted in the overall list of the 392 best colleges.

Schools don't pay to be included in the guide, but The Princeton Review clarified that schools could pay for a "featured" designation. No Houston university paid to be featured in this year's guide. Trinity University in San Antonio and Southwestern University, a private school in the Austin suburb Georgetown, were the only two Texas schools that paid to be "featured."

Rice and UH have been on a winning streak in separate reports of the best universities worldwide, best graduate schools, and best online degree programs.

In addition to being included in the overall list, Rice was highlighted as one of the Best Value Colleges, Colleges That Create Futures, and it earned high marks in Princeton Review's Mental Health Honor Roll 2026. The home of the Rice Owls also starred in the regional Best Southwest list that contained 41 universities across Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas.

"Rice University stands out as a leading research university where academic diversity and a wide array of interdisciplinary institutes and centers make it easy for students to explore multiple areas of interest," the school's profile says. "At Rice, 'knowledge isn’t siloed — students are constantly crossing disciplines and interests in ways that feel natural rather than exceptional.'"

Rice earned the following rankings on 14 other lists:

No. 1 – Lots of Race/Class Interaction
No. 3 – Best College Newspaper
No. 9 – Friendliest Students
No. 11 – Best Quality of Life
No. 13 – Great Financial Aid
No. 14 – Top 50 Best Value Private Colleges
No. 17 – Their Students Love These Colleges
No. 18 – Top 20 Best Value Private Colleges Without Aid
No. 18 – Best Student Support and Counseling Services
No. 19 – Best College Dorms
No. 21 – Students Study the Most
No. 24 – Best Campus Food
No. 24 – Best College Radio Station
No. 24 – Best-Run colleges

The University of Houston also appeared in the Best Southwest, Best Value Colleges, and Colleges That Create Futures lists, and it was named a top Green College, which examined schools that "share superb sustainability practices, a strong foundation in sustainability education, and a healthy quality of life for students on campus

UH earned five more accolades:

No. 1 – Top 50 Undergraduate Schools for Entrepreneurship Studies
No. 1 – Top Undergraduate Schools for Entrepreneurship Studies in the Southwest
No. 8 – Most Politically Moderate Students
No. 15 – Financial Aid Not So Great
No. 42 – Top 50 Best Value Public Colleges

In the school's profile, students say they had an overall positive experience thanks to UH's excellent academic offerings and dedicated faculty members.

"Students confirm that 'the research and other academic opportunities... are very accessible to students who seek it out,'" the profile says. "This includes taking advantage of UH’s vast alumni network (more than 325,000 and counting), not to mention its location in the corporate center of Houston, where 'the opportunities that are provided are immense.'"

The 12 other public and private universities in Texas included in The Princeton Review's 2027 guide are:

The University of Texas at Austin
Southwestern University, Georgetown
Baylor University, Waco
Texas A&M University - College Station
Trinity University, San Antonio
Texas State University, San Marcos
Angelo State University, San Angelo
Texas Christian University, Fort Worth
University of Dallas, Irving
Southern Methodist University, Dallas
The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson
Austin College, Sherman

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A version of this story originally appeared on CultureMap.com.

Houston named the No.1 emerging city for biopharma in inaugural report

Biopharma Leader

Houston is ranked No.1 on the first-ever Next 10 U.S. Biopharma Clusters report published by Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News (GEN).

The report, which ranks the best emerging hubs for life science activities, considered patents, NIH funding, lab space, venture capital investments, and the number of jobs in regions in cities, states and “clusters” across the U.S. GEN touts Houston as the top city for the biopharma industry due to a surge in funding, job creation, medical innovations and startup success.

Here’s how Houston ranked in the report’s different categories;

No. 1 for NIH funding with 2,262 awards totaling more than $1.25 billion
No. 2 for emerging regions for jobs, with 28,000 jobs
No. 2 for lab space, with roughly 8 million square feet in the market
No. 6 for patents, with 2,760 patent families

According to BioHouston chairman Jeff Wade, Houston secured half a billion dollars in venture capital funding in 2025 and 2026 to date.

The report called out major biopharm news out of Houston in the last few months, including Bristol Myers Squibb selecting Houston for its $1 billion, 600,000-square-foot manufacturing site and Eli Lily selecting Houston for its $6.5 billion, 236-acre manufacturing site. Both facilities will be located within Generation Park, a 4,300-acre, master-planned commercial district near Lake Houston.

Houston startups like CrossBridge Bio and Duracyte were also mentioned in the report. CrossBridge, which develops antibody-drug conjugates for cancer, was acquired by Eli Lily in April for $300 million. Duracyte, a “living pharmacy” company, was launched out of Rice University’s biotech venture studio RBL LLC this spring and is backed by up to a $45 million Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) award.

The startup is working to commercialize its Hybrid Advanced Molecular Manufacturing Regulator (HAMMR) technology, a rechargeable, implantable device that can sense biological signals, monitor tumor environments and adjust therapeutic output in real time.

“There’s a lot of great talent, but the unique advantage that we have is we are able to benefit from a lot of unique clinical infrastructure and clinician insights,” Omid Veiseh, Duracyte co-founder and managing partner of RBL LLC, told GEN. “There are a lot of clinicians here who are eager to partner on investigator-initiated trials.”

The report also touted Houston’s Texas Medical Center, home to the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and Baylor College of Medicine, and international partnerships like the recently expanded TMC Korea BioBridge.

Other cities to make the list include:

No. 2 Minneapolis-St. Paul
No. 3 Denver-Boulder
No. 4 St. Louis
No. 5 Dallas-Fort Worth

States to make the list include:

No. 1 Ohio (including Cincinnati, Cleveland, and Columbus)
No. 2 Indiana (including Indianapolis)
No. 3 Florida (including Jacksonville and Miami-Fort Lauderdale)
No. 4 Georgia (including Atlanta and Augusta)
No. 5 Wisconsin (including Madison and Kenosha)

Regional state clusters to watch include:

Phoenix
Pittsburgh
Greater Richmond, Virginia
South Carolina
Utah

See the full report here.

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