The dog days of Texas summer are here, with temperatures hitting 100 degrees. So stay inside and catch up on the latest innovation news:
—SailPoint, an Austin-TX-based maker of identity management software, has purchased Whitebox Security, a security software firm based in Sunnyvale, CA. Whitebox’s products will still be offered under the “SecurityIQ” name. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
—The Dallas Entrepreneur Center and Comerica Bank have joined together for the second annual North Texas Business Pitch competition, but, this time, the focus will be on minority and women-led startups. The winning startup will receive $50,000 as well as in-kind support from the DEC. The pitch competition is currently taking applications from interested startups; finalists will be named in November.
—Consortia Health, an Austin, TX-based healthcare company, is two-thirds of the way to a $2 million funding round to help it grow its pelvic floor exercise business. The company works primarily with OBGYNs to set up treatment packages for patients with incontinence. As many as a third of American men and women suffer from the ailment.
—Neos Therapeutics, a Dallas-area biotech, filed for its IPO this week. The company makes a delivery system for ADHD drugs and expects to raise about $60 million from the offering. Shares are expected to price between $14 and $16 apiece.
—Paris-based Sanofi has added the University of Texas System to its roster of institutions it partners with on a program to fund early drug discovery research. Sanofi will provide $2.4 million in funding for three years through its Sanofi Innovation Awards program for UT and six other schools.
—Dallas is now home to an accelerator targeted to real estate startups. The new accelerator, which is called Motive, will invest $40,000 in exchange for an equity stake. A demo day is planned for November.
—Dallas venture capital firm Green Park & Golf has invested in Swedish medical device company Digitana, which will create a US headquarters in the North Texas city. Digitana has a scalp-cooling cap that can help save hair during chemotherapy treatments. It received $850,000 from the Dallas venture firm.
—XPrize has teamed up with the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy and the Dollar General Literacy Foundation in a $7 million Adult Literacy XPrize, a global competition for mobile apps of use to adult learners. After a six-month registration period, the teams will have 18 months to complete their projects. Five finalists will be tested by a minimum of 1,000 adult learners, who read at or below the equivalent of a third-grade reading level.
— The former Ellington Air Force Base in Houston has been designated as the nation’s 10th Spaceport. The Federal Aviation Administration made the announcement earlier this month at the former World War I base near NASA’s Johnson Space Center.
—Speaking of space, one of the companies that has said would join the development there at the Spaceport is Houston-based Intuitive Machines. Founded by a former deputy director of NASA, Steve Altemus, the company applies the rigor of engineering for manned spaceflight to other industries such as energy and healthcare.
