5 most popular innovation stories in Houston this week

what's trending

Events not to miss this month — and other Houston innovation news that trended this week. Photo via Getty Images

Editor's note: Another week has come and gone, and it's time to round up the top headlines from the past few days. Trending Houston tech and startup news on InnovationMap included June business events not to miss, innovators to know, and more.


3 Houston innovators to know this week

This week's roundup of Houston innovators includes Ramanan Krishnamoorti of UH, Valerie Tompson of SWAN Impact Network, Evan Erickson of TexPower Technologies. Photos courtesy

In this week's roundup of Houston innovators to know, I'm introducing you to three local innovators across industries — from battery tech to impact investing — recently making headlines in Houston innovation. Read more.

10+ can't-miss Houston business and innovation events for June

Check out these conferences, pitch competitions, networking, and more in the month of June. Photo via Getty Images

It's time to look at what's on the agenda for June for Houston innovators — from pitch competitions to networking events.

Here's a roundup of events not to miss this month. Mark your calendars and register accordingly. Read more.

Texas angel investor group expands to make impact in Houston

Austin-founded SWAN Impact Network has entered the Houston innovation ecosystem. Photo via Getty Images

An angel investment network founded in Austin has announced its entrance into the Houston market.

SWAN Impact Network, which focuses on funding early-stage, impact-driven startups, announced that Houston will be its next market expansion. Founded in 2016, the organization expanded to Dallas two years ago. Now, SWAN is hitting the Bayou City and is actively looking for potential angel investors to join its network.

"Houston is the logical place for us to go because a lot of our deep expertise we developed is grounded around life science, health and wellness, and environmental," Bob Bridge, executive director of SWAN, tells InnovationMap. "There's a lot of people in Houston in the spaces where we've spent most of our time and money." Read more.

Houston digital health startup acquired by Illinois-based company

Houston-based Melax Tech has been acquired. Photo via MelaxTech.com

A Houston startup has exited to a clinical terminology management and data quality solutions company.

Melax Technologies Inc., an artificial intelligence and natural language processing technology company, has been acquired by Intelligent Medical Objects, which is headquartered in the Chicago area. It's the first acquisition for IMO, and the deal will allow for the company to expand its offerings to various segments in the health care market.

"Today marks an exciting moment for IMO as we complete our first acquisition,” says Ann Barnes, CEO at IMO, in a news release. “Combining Melax Tech’s analytics and NLP capabilities with IMO’s clinical terminology and data quality platform will enable healthcare organizations to have a more comprehensive solution for both clinical operation and research. Read more.

Houston health care institution secures $100M for expansion, shares renderings

Baylor College of Medicine's Lillie and Roy Cullen Tower is set to open in 2026. Rendering courtesy of SLAM Architecture

Baylor College of Medicine has collected $100 million toward its $150 million fundraising goal for the college’s planned Lillie and Roy Cullen Tower.

The $100 million in gifts include:

  • A total of $30 million from The Cullen Foundation, The Cullen Trust for Health Care, and The Cullen Trust for Higher Education.
  • $12 million from the DeBakey Medical Foundation
  • $10 million from the Huffington Foundation
  • More than $45 million from members of Baylor’s Board of Trustees and other community donors, including the M.D. Anderson Foundation, the Albert and Margaret Alkek Foundation, and The Elkins Foundation.

“The Cullen Trust for Health Care is very honored to support this building along with The Cullen Foundation and The Cullen Trust for Higher Education,” Cullen Geiselman Muse, chair of The Cullen Trust for Health Care, says in a news release. “We cannot wait to see what new beginnings will come from inside the Lillie and Roy Cullen Tower.” Read more.

Here's what Houston innovation news trended — from workforce trends in Houston to top articles in 2019. Photo by PeopleImages

5 most popular innovation stories in Houston this week

What's trending

Editor's note: In the first trending news roundup for InnovationMap in 2020, top stories include end-of-the-year roundups, experts talking about the future of the workforce in Houston, fundraising in Texas, and more.

Overheard: Experts weigh in on the future of the workforce in Houston

From the rise of freelancers to Houston's data-driven future, here's what the Bayou City can expect to see when it comes to the future of the workforce. Pexels

As the new decade approaches, there are a lot of questions about the future of the workforce in Houston. Will automation revolutionize jobs? Is technology evolving too quickly for training and education to keep up? And, can corporations adapt their work environments to account for the rise in freelancers?

At the launch of Houston's new General Assembly location, a panel of Houstonians moderated by Joey Sanchez of Houston Exponential addressed these questions and more earlier this month. The global digital skill development organization will launch a three-month software engineering program in January along with workshops and introductory courses before rolling out other part- and full-time courses in 2020. Continue reading.

Top 5 Houston innovation lifestyle stories for 2019

From a new, innovative mixed use development to food and fitness startups, here's what lifestyle innovation trended in Houston this year. Courtesy of The MKT

Innovation surrounds us, from the B2B startups designing software solutions for huge oil and gas corporations to a fitness app that allows users to safely and efficiently book private trainers.

During 2019, InnovationMap published stories on these startups, burgeoning mixed-use spaces, innovative sustainable stores, and more. Here's which of those stories readers flocked to. Continue reading.

Here's what you need to know if you're raising a seed round in Texas

From friends and family rounds to how to navigate a seed round, here's what you need to know about raising money in Texas. Getty Images

In the vast majority of startups we've worked with across Texas, their "seed round" is not the first money in the door. That money is often called a "Friends & Family Round" and it's usually from people so close to the entrepreneurs that they are willing to take a gamble before there is really even much "there" to invest in. It also might include bootstrap funds put in by the entrepreneurs themselves.

After an F&F Round, Texas startups will pursue a "seed round," which generally includes some angel investors in the local and broader ecosystem. A problem we occasionally run into is that Texas entrepreneurs, including those in Houston, will get bad advice on what the right structures are for this kind of deal; either because they are reading a blog post from Silicon Valley (where things work VERY differently) or they're talking to someone marketing themselves as an "adviser" when their advice doesn't have much substantive deal experience backing it. Continue reading.

5 Houston innovators to know in 2020

From M&A action to the development of Houston's innovation corridor, these are five Houston innovators to keep an eye on in 2020. Courtesy photos

For so many Houston innovators, 2020 will be a year of growth, execution, proof of concept, piloting, pivoting, fundraising, and more.

It's hard to narrow down the list of movers and shakers in Houston innovation, but a few have stood out for making waves in the new year. From M&A action to the development of Houston's innovation corridor, these are five Houston innovators to keep an eye on in 2020. Continue reading.

Editor's Picks: Top 10 Houston startup feature stories of 2019

Human-tissue printing technology, blockchain networks, health care solutions, game-changing software — all this innovation and more is coming out of Houston startups. Courtesy photos

Thousands of startups call Houston home. According to the Greater Houston Partnership's data, the Houston area added 11,700 firms between 2013 to 2018. And, if you consider Crunchbase's tally, at the end of 2018, Houston had over 1,400 tech startups on the investment tracking website's radar.

This past year, InnovationMap featured profiles on dozens of these Houston startups — from blockchain and software companies to startups with solutions in health care and oil and gas. Here are 10 that stood out throughout 2019. Continue reading.

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Houston humanoid robotics startup Persona AI hires new strategy leader

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Houston-based Persona AI, a two-year-old startup that develops robots for heavy industry, has hired an automation and robotics professional as its head of commercial strategy.

In his new position, Michael Perry will focus on building Persona AI’s business development operations, coordinating with strategic partners and helping early adopters of the company’s humanoids. Target customers include offshore platforms, shipyards, steel mills and construction sites.

Perry previously served as vice president of business development at Boston Dynamics, where he led market identification for robotics, and as an executive at DJI. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Chinese and government studies from the University of Texas at Austin.

“Now is the perfect time to join Persona AI as we rapidly close the gap between what’s possible in the lab versus what’s driving real commercial value,” Perry says. “Building industry-hardened humanoid hardware and production-deployable AI is only one piece of the puzzle.”

“Getting humanoids into operations for heavy industry will require the systematic commercial and operational work that makes enterprises humanoid-ready and defining the business case, solving the integration challenges, and building the playbook for safe, scalable adoption,” he adds. “That’s what I’m here to build.”

Rice to lead Space Force tech institute under $8.1M agreement

space deal

Rice University has signed an $8.1 million cooperative agreement to lead the U.S. Space Force University Consortium/Space Strategic Technology Institute 4 (SSTI).

The new entity will be known as the Center for Advanced Space Sensing Technologies (CASST) at Rice and will focus on developing innovative remote sensing technologies.

“This investment positions Rice at the forefront of the technologies that will define how we see, understand and operate in space,” Amy Dittmar, Howard R. Hughes Provost and executive vice president for academic affairs, said in a news release. “By bringing together advanced remote sensing, AI-driven analysis and cross-institutional expertise, CASST will help transform raw space data into real-time insight and expand the frontiers of scientific discovery.

The news comes shortly after the Texas Space Commission approved a nearly $14.2 million grant for the newly created Center for Space Technologies at Rice.

David Alexander, director of the Rice Space Institute, will lead CASST. Alexander is also an inaugural member of the Texas Aerospace Research and Space Economy Consortium and he serves on the boards of the Houston Spaceport Development Corporation, SpaceCom and the Sasakawa International Center for Space Architecture. The team also includes Rice professors and staff Kevin Kelly, Tomasz Tkaczyk, Kenny Evans, Kaden Hazzard, Mark Jernigan and Vinod Veedu, and collaborators from Houston-based Aegis Aerospace, University of California, Los Angeles, University of California, Santa Barbara and Georgia Institute of Technology.

In addition to bringing new space sensor innovation, the team will also work to miniaturize sensors while developing and implementing low-resource fabrication techniques, according to Rice. The researchers will also utilize AI and machine learning to analyze sensor data.

The U.S. Space Force uses space sensors to provide real-time information about space environments and assess potential threats. CASST is the fourth Space Strategic Technology Institute established by the USSF.

“Rice has helped shape the modern era of space research, and CASST marks a bold step into what comes next,” David Sholl, executive vice president for research at Rice, said in a news release. “As space becomes more contested and more essential to daily life, the ability to rapidly sense, interpret and act on what’s happening beyond Earth is critical. This center brings together the materials, engineering and data science innovations needed to deliver that capability."

The USSF University Consortium works with academic teams to develop breakthrough technologies and speed their transition into real-world applications for the U.S. Space Force.

The recent Rice award is part of $16 million over about three years. The USSF also signed a cooperative agreement with the University of Arizona in February.

The consortium has also helped facilitate several technological and commercial transitions over the last two years, including a $36 million commercial contract awarded to Axiom by Texas A&M University's in-space operations team and a follow-on $6 million contract to Axiom to build on technology developed by the University of Texas.

Leading Houston energy ecosystem rebrands for next phase

new look

Houston-based Energytech Nexus has rebranded.

The cleantech founders community will now be known as Energytech Cypher. Organizers say the new name was inspired by the Arabic roots of the word cypher, ṣifr, which is also the root of the word zero.

"A cypher is a key that unlocks what's hidden," Nada Ahmed, co-founder and chief revenue officer of Energytech Cypher, said in a news release. "And zero? Zero is where every transformation begins, the leap from 0 to 1, from idea to reality, from potential to power. We decode the energy transition by connecting the right founders, the right capital, and the right corporate partners at the right time, because the most important journey in energy is the one that takes you from nothing to something."

Energytech Nexus has rebranded to Energytech Cypher.

Co-founder and CEO Jason Ethier says that the name change better reflects the organization's mission.

"The energy transition doesn't have a technology problem. It has a connection problem," Ehtier added in the release. "The right founders exist. The right investors exist. The right partners exist. What's been missing is the infrastructure to bring them together—to decode the complexity, remove the friction, and make sure the best technologies find the markets that need them. That's what this community has always done. Energytech Cypher is the name that finally says it."

Energytech Cypher, previously known as Energytech Nexus, was first launched in 2023 and has grown from a podcast to a 130-member ecosystem. It has supported startups including Capwell Services, Resollant, Syzygy Plasmonics, Hertha Metals, Solidec and many others.

It is known for its flagship programs like the Pilotathon, which connects founders with industry partners for pilot opportunities. The event debuted in 2024.

Energytech Cypher also launched its COPILOT Accelerator last year. The accelerator partners with Browning the Green Space, a nonprofit that promotes diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in the clean energy and climatech sectors. The inaugural cohort included two Houston-based startups and 12 others from around the U.S.

It also hosts programs like Liftoff, Energy Tech Market, lunch and learns, CEO roundtables, investor workshops and international partnership initiatives.

Last year, Energytech Cypher also announced a new strategic ecosystem partnership with Greentown Labs, aimed at accelerating growth for clean energy startups. It also named its global founding partners, including Houston-based operations such as Chevron Technology Ventures, Collide, Oxy Technology Ventures, and others from around the world.

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This article originally appeared on our sister site, EnergyCapitalHTX.com.

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