Stoll of the Kauffman Foundation. “And the community’s ability to connect their entrepreneurs to the resources and knowledge they need is fundamental to grow entrepreneurs. … The answers that Dallas might need could exist in Austin and San Antonio.”
Barbary Brunner, the Austin Technology Council’s CEO, says her organization’s goal is to enable 10 technology companies to reach $1 billion in revenue in 10 years. But so far, at least, that’s not likely to happen without business investment and expertise from outside the city limits. “If you’re going to raise a $40 million round as Phunware did [last fall], you have to go out of market,” she says.
The statewide push espoused by Baer comes as the innovation ecosystems in each of Texas’s major cities have experienced drastic growth. Capital Factory started in 2009 and, as the birthplace of the South By Southwest Interactive festival, Austin is home to multiple co-working spaces, tech startups, and investment firms. The DEC was founded in 2013, joining accelerators such as Tech Wildcatters and Revtech. San Antonio’s tech startup roots stem from initiatives such as the founding of co-working space Geekdom and the San Antonio Angel Network, as well as a burgeoning cybersecurity sector and efforts to bring a biotech incubator to town.
Meanwhile, Houston political and business leaders are working on an effort to create an innovation district that could jumpstart tech entrepreneurship in areas that are within the city’s natural economic strengths, such as industrial applications and energy exploration. That effort is also being championed by co-working space Station Houston, which started last year with the intention of being a hub for this sort of activity.
And new connections between the cities seem to be emerging. As a venture capitalist, Michael Girdley says he isn’t bound by geography—he’ll invest in a good company where he can find one. Still, having a group like Station Houston on the ground makes it easier for him to decide to go spend a day in Houston scouting for investment opportunities.
“For someone like myself who wants to invest in a community, [Station Houston] is super useful,” says Girdley, co-founder of the Geekdom Fund in San Antonio, which raised a $20 million fund earlier this year. “They will set up a day for you with space and help you meet companies. It just makes it easier.”
For Richard Bagdonas, an Austin-based health IT entrepreneur, a key factor in promoting more statewide collaboration in healthcare is the Texas Medical Center’s Innovation Institute. Founded in 2015, the institute, which hosts medical device and digital health accelerator programs as well as a biodesign fellowship, presents itself as a “third coast” health ecosystem—competing with other national hubs—that happens to be based in Houston.
That mindset has helped foster more collaboration between Houston and Austin, Bagdonas says. “We believe our backyard is all of
