a service that it says allows customers and businesses to quickly reduce monthly bills, such as for satellite TV, Internet, or home security. Users upload bills and Billshark searches for discounts or other ways to find savings. The startup takes a 40 percent cut of any savings found, it said.
—Southern Methodist University in Dallas will open a new startup incubator at the Foundry Club, a coworking station near its campus. The university is investing as much as $200,000 a year in the program, D Magazine reported, and will be open to startups founded by students, faculty, and staff. Startups that win SMU’s Big iDeas Business Plan Competition or MBA Business Plan Competition get automatic admission.
—Six startups have been selected for Geekdom’s pre-accelerator program. The co-working space and Alamo Angels announced the group of companies, which are using analytics, virtual reality, and mobile technologies, among others. The program starts Thursday and runs through May 31. For more information on the program or the startups, click here.
—Student entrepreneurs from MIT took home the most prize money at this year’s Rice Business Plan Competition, winning more than $500,000 in cash and prizes. The startup, Infinite Cooling, “uses electric fields to recover water from the evaporative losses of cooling towers so that the same water can be used repeatedly,” according to a Rice press release. Aday Technologies, a Harvard University-based developer of workforce management software, won about $200,000, while Lapovations, a medical device company from the University of Arkansas, won $150,000.
—Lastly, life sciences advocacy group BioHouston held its 15th annual Chili Cookoff. The contest is a highlight of the biotech industry’s calendar and features the city’s biotech innovators dressed up in costumes and manning themed-booths as they cook their chilis. Scientific supplies company, VWR, sported a baseball-themed booth and took the top prize of Grand Champion Chili. Texas Heart Institute, a perennial winner, won the prizes for best team theme, spirit, and hospitality. The THI team sported a rock-n-roll theme, complete with purple punk-rock wigs.
