10+ Houston innovation leaders in the spotlight at SXSW 2026

where to be

Catch these Houston innovators at SXSW 2026. Photo courtesy of SXSW

Houston's innovation scene will be well represented at South by Southwest (SXSW) this month.

The week-long, Austin-based conference and festival will spotlight some of the Bayou City's leaders in health care, energy, space and more. The event kicks off today, March 12, and runs through March 18. The SXSW Innovation Conference will feature keynotes, workshops, mentoring sessions and more throughout various venues in the city.

Here's who to see and when and where to find them:

March 12

Aileen Allen, venture partner at Mercury Fund

Mentor Session from 4-5:15 p.m. at Hilton Austin Downtown

Allen will host a mentoring session focused on funding, marketing, advertising, PR and the future of work.

March 13

Heath Butler, partner at Mercury Fund

SXSW Pitch-Smart Cities, Transportation, Manufacturing & Logistics from 2:30-3:30 p.m. at the J.W. Marriott

Butler will judge five innovative startups as they pitch their solutions to advance smart cities, enhance transportation systems, modernize manufacturing, transform logistics, and strengthen government infrastructure and civic operations.

Jonathan Cirtain, CEO and president of Axiom Space

The Clock is Ticking for Space - Replacing the ISS from 4-5 p.m. at the J.W. Marriott

Cirtain will discuss Axiom's pursuit of building the world’s first commercial space station.

March 14

Jesse Martinez, founder and CEO of LSA Global

SXSW Pitch-Intelligent Systems, Robotics, & Multisensory Technology from 10-11 a.m. at the J.W. Marriott

Martinez will judge five innovative startups as they pitch their technologies that aim to enhance the way people connect, communicate and share unique life experiences with those around them in a digital ecosystem.

Jennifer Schmitt, head of operations at Rhythm Energy

Powering Texas with Reliable Integrated High-Demand Energy from 10-11 a.m. at Marlow

Schmitt will join a panel to discuss how EirGrid, the state-owned electric power transmission operator in Ireland, is pioneering solutions as the country works toward 80 percent renewable integration by 2030.

Saki Sasagawa, director of business development for JETRO Houston

Now is Japan's Time: Leading the Future with Deep Tech from 10-11 a.m. at the J.W. Marriott

Sasagawa joins a panel that will share real-time insights from diverse perspectives on the forefront of Japan’s deep tech and IP businesses.

March 15

Bosco Lai, CEO and co-founder of Little Place Labs

SXSW Pitch Alumni: Where Are They Now? from 10-11 a.m. at the J.W. Marriott

Lai joins a panel of four former SXSW Pitch winners to share how they leveraged the platform to take their startups to the next level.

Tara Karimi, cofounder and chief science and sustainability officer at Cemvita

South by South America: The Rise of Southern Brazil Tech from 2:30-3:30. p.m. at The Line

Karimi will participate in a panel to discuss how Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil's southernmost state, is attracting elite talent and AI infrastructure and share insights on navigating the next wave of South American tech growth.

March 16

Dr. Pavitra P. Krishnamani, emergency medicine physician at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

Viva La Revolution: How the Digital Age is Transforming Wellness from 11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. at Hilton Austin Downtown

Krishnamani will discuss the latest advancements and policies that can accelerate the digital age of health care, such as wearables, telehealth and artificial intelligence.

March 18

Charlie Childs, co-founder and CEO of Intero Biosystems

Spinning Out: What It Takes to Build a University Startup from 2:30-3:30 p.m. at The Line

Childs will join founders who spun their companies out of the University of Michigan to share the real story of navigating IP, early capital, team building, market validation and the “valley of death.”

Dr. James Allison, regental chair of immunology and director of The Allison Institute at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

Dr. Padmanee Sharma, professor in the Department of Genitourinary Medical Oncology, Division of Cancer Medicine at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

Beyond Checkpoints: Immunotherapy’s Next Act from 2:30-3:30 p.m. at the J.W. Marriott

Allison and Sharma will sit down with 21-year-old, Stage 4 cancer survivor Sharon Belvin and Time Magazine journalist Alice Park will discuss the future of immunotherapy and what challenges remain.

Last year, Houston startups Little Places Labs and Helix Earth won top prizes in their respective categories at the prestigious SXSW Pitch event, held this year from March 13-14. No Houston startups were named finalists to compete in this year's event.

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Headed to SXSW 2025? Here's what to do. Photo courtesy of SXSW

9 innovation & networking events for Houstonians to attend at SXSW 2025

A Houstonian's Guide to SXSW

South by Southwest, Austin's signature hybrid music, film and interactive festival, returns to the Texas capital this month, running March 7 through 15.

In the business and innovation sector, the festival fuses together SXSW Edu for educators at the beginning of the week and SXSW Interactive, which is one of the largest gatherings in the world of innovators, technologists, artists, startups, investors and policy-makers. SXSW is a powerful international magnet for creators and the people who serve them.

I started coming to Austin for SXSW in 1999, a few years after the Interactive portion (nicknamed "Spring Break for Nerds") launched and when the entire conference of 6,000 attendees fit into the Austin Convention Center. Back then, you could rub shoulders with famous bloggers who challenged established tech journalists in the hallways, multimedia artists handing out bootleg CD-ROMS, and hard-core geeks setting web standards and laws related to technology that we enjoy today.

SXSW, like Austin itself, has grown up quite a bit in the last two decades and has fended off the common Austin refrain of "It was better X years ago," as everything has become more commercial, less "authentic" and more expensive. SXSW officially sells tickets or badges for $2295.00 at the Platinum level (with cheaper options as well) providing access to stand in lines with hundreds of your friends for the most popular keynotes and panels.

One critical tradition of SXSW and part of the relentless motivation to "Keep Austin Weird" is the dozens of unofficial side events that pop up during the event all across the city. These unofficial events and activations typically provide networking opportunities fueled by the draw of internet-famous speakers, free food, and free alcohol. As SXSW has grown exponentially, it still seems to retain its charm and quirkiness as not quite a music festival, like Bonnaroo or Lollapalooza, nor a film festival like Sundance or Tribeca, and certainly not a traditional tech conference like CES. I like to think of it as a Carnival with many things to do and see but without a specific agenda or outcome. Since COVID and the financial market retraction, these parties and happy hours have become a lot more restrained, but they still exist if you know where to look.

This article is designed to guide you through the highlights, both official and unofficial, of SXSW with a focus on professional business development with a strong bent toward networking with tech startups. Here's what not to miss.

Friday, March 7

Equitech Texas Welcome Breakfast
9–11 a.m.
Inn Cahoots, 1221 E 6th St.
A breakfast gathering of people involved with Impact Investing and Equity Tech, led by Laurie Felker Jones

Startup Superconnector featuring Practice Pitch
11 a.m.–4 p.m.
Funded House, 315 Lavaca St.
This is a "Pop Up Pitch" event designed to help startups with their investor pitches by putting them in the same room with investors and professional service providers.

Startup Crawl at SXSW 2025
5 p.m. for Backstage VIP
6–9 p.m.
Capital Factory, 701 Brazos St., Suite 1600

Startup Crawl is arguably the most important unofficial event during SXSW where hundreds of startups showcase their offerings in a huge trade show, party format.

Saturday, March 8

The Red ThreadX
607 W. Third Street, 29th Floor
Curated content, strategic connections and actionable insights for military and defense-oriented businesses

SXSW 2025: Dolphin Tank
8–10:30 a.m.
FQ Lounge: Waller Creek Boathouse, 74 Trinity St.
In partnership with Amazon and The Female Quotient, this event is dedicated to championing women entrepreneurs.

Sunday, March 9

2025 TXST SXSW Lab: The Bobcat Den
1:30–8:00 p.m.
The Bobcat Den @ SXSW, Q-Branch 200 E. Sixth St., Suite 310
PROMO CODE: MICHAELBESTVIP
The TXST SXSW Lab: The Bobcat Den is a dynamic, all-day event that showcases Texas State University’s cutting-edge research, industry collaborations, and student innovation.

Monday, March 10

Founded in Texas - For Women Founders
9 a.m.–12:30 p.m.
Brown Advisory, 200 W. Sixth St., Suite 1700
Project W, The Artemis Fund, HearstLab and Brown Advisory have joined forces to bring you Founded in Texas, an investor feedback session designed to support Texas-based women who are founders of B2B and B2B2C technology companies.

Inaugural Texas House
11:00 a.m. on Monday, March 10, until 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday March 11
315 Lavaca St.
More than ever, Texans are leading at the frontiers of technology, entrepreneurship, and culture. See the full agenda

Tuesday, March 11

Super Connectors Meet Up
4–5 p.m.
Hilton Austin Downtown, 500 E. Fourth St., Room 412
*Badge-only event
"Superconnectors," tor those who seem hyper-connected to large networks of people, are naturally drawn to SXSW. They thrive in a creative and innovative environment, affording them countless opportunities to meet interesting people. Meet some here.

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This information and more can be found at Marc Nathan's VIP Insider’s Guide to SXSW.


With three weeks left until game time, South by Southwest announced another long list of featured and keynote speakers. Photo via SXSW

SXSW announces even more featured speakers joining the 2023 program

headed to texas

Whether the return of South by Southwest (SXSW) in three weeks is putting butterflies in your tummy or sweat on your brow, we're in the home stretch. The newest announcement — another wave of featured speakers — does not say it's the final round, but time is running out to make adjustments before the start of the festival on March 10.

Previous announcements included keynote addresses from Patagonia CEO Ryan Gellert and team members who worked on the James Webb Space Telescope. There have also been two rounds of music showcase announcements, culminating in a list of nearly 500 performances.

The announcement on February 14 is heavy with big names including three entertainers presenting keynotes: actor, producer, and New York Times bestselling author Priyanka Chopra Jonas; Grammy Award-nominated singer-songwriter, producer, and author Margo Price; and Academy Award winner Tilda Swinton.

Two more newly announced keynote sessions come with longer descriptions: Chef José Andrés presents The Stories We Tell Can Change the World, and Bernard Sumner, Stephen Morris, and Gillian Gilbert of New Order appear in conversation with The Times rock & pop critic Will Hodgkinson.The former keynote tackles the responsibility of storytellers to address crises around the world, using Andrés' humanitarian group World Central Kitchen as a lens. The latter discusses the discography and history of the history-making band.

“Today's speaker announcement is a fantastic milestone for the 2023 event and spotlights five additional Keynotes and numerous Featured Speakers, including influential icons and up and coming innovators,” said Chief Programming Officer and Co-President Hugh Forrest. “We are extremely proud to have assembled a diverse, comprehensive conference program for SXSW, and we can’t wait to share it with our community in March.”

Organized into 25 programming tracks presented in a variety of session formats, SXSW celebrates the convergence of technology, film, television, and music. Tracks include civic engagement, climate change, design, film and TV, psychedelics, sports, travel, and more.

Just some featured speakers and sessions joining the 2023 lineup include:

  • Chair and CEO of General Motors Mary Barra with CEO, CTO, President, and co-founder of Cruise and co-founder of Twitch Kyle Vogt
  • Actress, philanthropist, entrepreneur, New York Times bestselling author, and co-founder of Hello Bello Kristen Bell, CEO of Hello Bello Erica Buxton, and actor, comedian, filmmaker, host of the podcast Armchair Expert, and co-founder of Hello Bello Dax Shepard
  • Chief Diversity Officer of TBWA\North America Aliah Berman with activist, advocate, author, and founder of the #MeToo Movement Tarana Burke
  • Founder and CEO of Joby Aviation Joe
  • Ben Bevirt with Chief Sustainability Officer at Delta Air Lines Pam Fletcher
  • Chief Digital and Commercial Officer at Unilever Conny Braams, President, Worldwide Advertising at Netflix Jeremi Gorman, founder and CEO of Media
  • Link Michael Kassan, and Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing and Communications Officer at Delta Air Lines Tim Mapes
  • Co-founder and President of OpenAI Greg Brockman with founder and CEO of Dot Dot Dot Media Laurie Segall
  • United States Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm
  • General Partner at Benchmark Bill Gurley with investor, New York Times bestselling author and host of the podcast The Tim Ferriss Show Tim Ferriss
  • The Art of Creating Influence 101 on navigating entertainment careers
  • The Blog Era: Hip-Hop's Wild Wild West on the influence of music bloggers
  • Daddy Issues in Film on fathers in film
  • Dateline 24/7: How the True Crime Powerhouse Became a Podcast Empire on a genre leader
  • Driving Personal Health Forward: The Role of Apple Watch and iPhone on digitally monitoring health at home
  • Evil Dead Rise: Flesh-Possessing Demons Come Home on the new Evil Dead film
  • An Inside Look at “Blindspotting” Season 2 with Rafael Casal and Daveed Diggs on the continuation of the series
  • Onyx Collective Presents “UnPrisoned” on a new Hulu series
  • The Kids Are (Not) Alright: Gun Violence Terrorizing Youth of America on activism and justice
  • Leguizamo Does America: Next Stop – Austin on the contributions of U.S. Latinos

For a full lineup and more information on featured sessions, visit SXSW.com.

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This article originally ran on CultureMap.

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Cancer diagnostics startup wins top prize at annual Rice competition​

winner, winners

Rice University student-founded companies took home a total of $115,000 in equity-free funding at the annual Liu Idea Lab for Innovation and Entrepreneurship's H. Albert Napier Rice Launch Challenge last week.

2025 Rice Innovation Fellow Alexandria Carter won the top prize and $50,000 for her startup Bionostic. The startup offers personalized diagnostics for cancer patients by using 3D culturing through its Advanced Tumor Landscape Analysis System (ATLAS) platform.

Carter is working toward her PhD in bioengineering in Professor Michael King's laboratory. She recently completed the Rice Innovation Fellows program and plans to commercialize ATLAS, according to a news release from Rice.

Actile Technologies, founded by another former Rice Innovation Fellow, Barclay Jumet, won second place and $25,000. The company is developing and commercializing textile-integrated technologies. InnovationMap first covered Jumet's wearable technology back in 2023.

Kairos took home the third-place prize and $15,000, plus the $2,000 audience choice award and the $5,000 undergraduate business award. Founded last year by Sanjana Kavula and Adhira Tippur, Kairos is an AI-powered patient intake platform built specifically for independent dental practices.

The NRLC features top startups founded by undergraduate, graduate and MBA students at Rice each year. The top three finishers were named among a group of five finalists earlier this year, which also included HAAST Autonomous and Project Kestrel.

HAAST is developing an unmanned aircraft for organ transport, while Kestrel uses machine learning to organize bird photographers’ photo collections.

Teams presented multiple five-minute pitches throughout the application process over Zoom and in-person before the five finalists presented at the NRLC Championships April 21 at the Rice Memorial Center. Each finalist walked away with an equity-free investment.


Other awards went to:

UnitCode

  • $5,000 MBA Venture Award

HAAST Autonomous

  • $2,500 Chan-Kang Family Prize for Bold Ambition
  • $1,000 Healthcare Innovations Prize

Telstar Networks

  • $2,500 Outstanding Undergraduate Startup Award

Multiplay

  • $1,500 Frank Liu Jr. Prize for Creative Innovation in Music, Fashion, & the Arts

Butterfly Books

  • $1,500 Social Impact Award

SOOZ

  • $1,000 Interdisciplinary Innovation Prize sponsored by OURI

Dooly

  • $1,000 Consumer Goods Prize

Project Kestrel

  • $1,000 AI Prize

Veloci Running won the NRLC last year for its naturally shaped running shoe. Founder and CEO Tyler Strothman recently told InnovationMap that the company has gone on to sell roughly 10,000 pairs of its flagship Ascent shoe, designed to relieve lower leg tightness and absorb impact. Read more here.

Houston-based, NASA-founded cleantech startup closes $12M seed round

Fresh Funds

Houston-based Helix Earth Technologies has closed a $12 million Seed 2 funding round to scale manufacturing of its energy-efficient commercial HVAC add-on technology.

Veriten, a Houston-based energy investment firm, led the round. Rua Ventures, Carnrite Ventures, Skywriter LLC and Textbook Ventures also participated.

Helix Earth—which was founded based on NASA technology, spun out of Rice University and has been incubated at Greentown Labs—is developing high-efficiency retrofit dehumidification systems that aim to reduce the energy consumption of commercial HVAC units. The company reports that its technology can lead to "healthier indoor air, lower energy bills, reduced building maintenance, and more comfortable spaces for building owners and occupants."

"Building owners are dealing with rising energy costs, uncontrolled humidity, and aging infrastructure with no viable, cost-effective path forward. We are in the field today solving these problems for commercial customers, and this capital puts us on an aggressive path to scale,” Rawand Rasheed, Helix Earth co-founder and CEO, said in a news release.

“The strength of this round reinforces our team's conviction that we can transform innovation-starved sectors with transformational solutions that deliver order-of-magnitude improvements to owners and operators, for both their bottom line and the environment,” Rasheed added.

Maynard Holt, Veriten’s founder and CEO, said that the investment firm is tripling its investment in Helix Earth.

"The team has built breakthrough technology with real applicability across multiple industries,” Holt said in the release. “Their first product will have an immediate and measurable impact on our energy system, and they are already pursuing adjacent innovations to help heavy industries operate more efficiently and with less waste. This is a well-rounded team with a proven track record of strong execution and disciplined capital management.”

Helix Earth also closed a $5.6 million seed funding round in 2024, led by Veriten.

Last year, the company secured a $1.2 million Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II grant and won in the Smart Cities, Transportation & Sustainability contest at the 2025 SXSW Pitch Showcase. Rasheed was also named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 Energy and Green Tech list for 2025.

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This article originally appeared on EnergyCapital HTX.com.

Texas earns 22nd 'best state for business' title as GDP hits $2.9T

booming economy

The Texas business sector recently received a double dose of good news.

For the 22nd consecutive year, Chief Executive magazine named Texas the best state for business. In tandem with that achievement, preliminary new estimates from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis show the size of Texas’ economy jumped to $2.9 trillion in 2025, up by a nation-leading growth rate of 2.5 percent compared with the previous year.

Speaking about the Chief Executive honor, Gov. Greg Abbott says Texas benefits from pro-growth policies, a strong workforce, strategic investments in education, training for high-demand skills and the presence of critical infrastructure.

“Texas is where businesses innovate and where opportunity abounds. … We will continue to move at the speed of business as we build a more prosperous Texas for generations to come,” the governor says.

An annual Chief Executive survey of CEOs, presidents and business owners determines which state is the best for business. Texas has landed at No. 1 every year since Chief Executive launched the ranking.

“Truly, this is an incredible run that Texas has going,” says Christopher Chalk, publisher of Chief Executive. “CEOs are a tough group to please, and yet year after year Texas continues to earn the top spot—no small feat.”

It’s also no small feat for a state to notch annual gains in its gross domestic product (GDP), a measurement of economic power based on the value of goods and services produced each year.

With an estimated GDP of $2.9 trillion last year, Texas maintains its position as the eighth-largest global economy compared with the nations of the world, based on preliminary estimates from the International Monetary Fund.

In reference to Texas’ GDP growth, Abbott says the Lone Star State is “the premier destination for job creators from across the country and world. We will keep attracting world-class investment, create jobs, and expand opportunity for Texans for generations to come.”
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