Every Last Word

Dallas Innovates’ signature series capturing what leaders across North Texas are saying — in their own words — about innovation, impact, and what’s next.

The Last Word: LevelBlue’s Bob McCullen on ‘Simplifying Cybersecurity’ with AT&T

by | Jun 20, 2024
When Dallas-based LevelBlue spun out from AT&T Cybersecurity in May, it wasn't your typical startup. As Bob McCullen, LevelBlue's chairman and CEO, told IT industry publication CRN, the new company launched as one of the largest startups in the cybersecurity industry to date.
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The Last Word: SilverStone Health’s Alfonso Montiel on Bringing ‘Transformative Change’ to a Broken System in Healthcare
by | Jun 19, 2024
That mission led to the creation of SilverStone Health, a fast-growing home health company, after Montiel acquired and rebranded Dallas-Fort Worth-based Comfort Care Hospice in 2020, This year, the company has expanded its continuum of care beyond hospice to include a full spectrum of home-based medical services, providing patients with seamless continuity of care across home health, wound care, telehealth, palliative care, hospice, and specialty physician services.
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The Last Word: Benjamin Vann on Impact Ventures Becoming the Second CDVC Firm in Texas
Vann's news: Impact Ventures "will be considered 1 of 74 [Community Development Venture Capital] firms in the U.S."—and the second in Texas—"providing more small businesses access to equity and equity-like capital, especially in times like today where interest rates are higher and traditional debt is considered to be expensive."
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The Last Word: Latosha Herron Bruff on the DRC’s New Disability Inclusion Toolkit
by | Jun 17, 2024
The Dallas Regional Chamber has unveilded a new tool that aims to support employees with disabilities in the region—while also helping boost prosperity for area businesses. The DRC's Disability Inclusion Toolkit gives businesses insights on the best ways to recruit, retain, include, and support employees with disabilities.
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The Last Word: Alamo Drafthouse Cinema Co‑Founder on Chain’s Acquisition by Sony Pictures Entertainment

by | Jun 13, 2024
Moviegoers in Dallas-Fort Worth have had their cinema-loving dreams dashed—and raised again—in the space of a week. First came word that Angelika Film Center & Cafe Plano was closing, followed by news that the franchise group running five Dallas-Fort Worth Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas had closed them down and filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy. The raised hopes? That came Wednesday, when Sony Pictures Entertainment rocked Hollywood by announcing it had acquired Alamo Drafthouse Cinema and its 35 locations in 25 metro areas, as well as its much-loved Fantastic Fest film festival.
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The Last Word: Better Block’s Krista Nightengale on June 13 Loneliness-Fighting Design Competition in Dallas
by | Jun 12, 2024
In partnership with Common Era and Humancraft, Better Block is hosting a "Creating Connections" design competition Thursday, June 13, from 4 to 8 p.m. at Thanks-Giving Square in Downtown Dallas. Aiming to "heal divides and create connections," eight teams will put their plywood public infrastructure pieces to the test. The public is invited to sit in, play with, and move around the designs and see if they create connections—with five national judges choosing a winner.
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The Last Word: Food Truck Operator on the Planned $155M Expansion of Dallas’ Klyde Warren Park
by | Jun 11, 2024
Downtown Dallas' Klyde Warren Park is slated to get a $155 million expansion, with 1.7 new acres extending the deck park over Woodall Rodgers Freeway via a new build-out between St. Paul and Akard. According to the Dallas Morning News, the park's leaders aim to re-bid the project—which was delayed by the pandemic—in 2025 and open the new addition by end of 2028.
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The Last Word: Rep. Marc Veasey on Ericsson’s $50M Additional Investment in Its USA 5G Smart Factory in North Texas
by | Jun 10, 2024
Late last month, Sweden-based Ericsson hosted an event at its USA 5G Smart Factory in the Dallas-Fort Worth suburb of Lewisville. The expanded 300,000-square-foot "highly automated" manufacturing plant employees more than 500 people is "at the forefront of building the next generation of 5G infrastructure in the United States," the company says. To support its mission, Ericsson announced an additional investment of $50 million in the plant on top of an initial $100 million announced in 2020.
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The Last Word: TXSE Group’s James Lee On His Planned Launch of the Texas Stock Exchange

by | Jun 5, 2024
As we noted in our top story today, Lee's TXSE Group plans to launch the Texas Stock Exchange (TXSE), focused on Texas and the Southeast U.S.  The group says it will provide "a venue to trade and list public companies and the growing universe of exchange-traded products" as a "fully electronic, national securities exchange." That's caused buzz across the Lone Star State—and especially on Wall Street.
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The Last Word: UTA’s Wei‑Jen Lee on $1.6M DOE Grant To Help Boost the Texas Grid
by | Jun 4, 2024
Lee is one of three UT Arlington faculty members who've been awarded $1.6 million from the Department of Energy to help boost the reliability of Texas's electric grid. The team is exploring the use of "behind-the-meter" energy devices that may help cut down on electricity consumption—and even upload energy to the grid itself, writes Fort Worth Report's Shomial Ahmad.
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The Last Word: Gemma Robotics’ Elizabeth Williams on Her Startup’s Autonomous Makeup Application Machine
by | May 31, 2024
Dallas-based Elizabeth (Whitelaw) Williams leads Gemma Robotics, a women-led, international beauty tech startup based in Texas and Haifa, Israel. Founded in 2022, Gemma is building what it calls "the world's first automatic makeup applicating machine."
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The Last Word: T.D. Jakes Enterprises COO on $500K Pitch Competition at Good Soil Forum in Dallas
by | May 30, 2024
Dallas-based social impact company T.D. Jakes Enterprises will be giving minority small business owners and entrepreneurs an opportunity to compete for grants totaling $500,000 during its 2nd Annual Seed Capital Pitch Competition, to be held June 13-15 at the AT&T Performing Arts Center in downtown Dallas.
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The Last Word: McKinney Doodle4Google Finalist Draws a Bee-Line to the Future

Earlier this year, Google asked students across the U.S. to submit their ideas through art to the prompt of “My wish for the next 25 years…” in celebration of Google’s 25th anniversary. Texas winner, McKinney elementary student Alice Kim, could be one of five national finalists. Cast your vote by June 4.
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The Last Word: Asset Panda’s Girish Kotte on Why Algorithms ‘Can’t Feel the Market Pulse’
by | May 21, 2024
In a LinkedIn post, he offers his "controversial take" that AI won't make humans obsolete in sectors like the stock market. Why? "Because markets are more than numbers; they're a reflection of human behaviors, fears, hopes, and irrationalities."
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The Last Word: Sow Good’s Ira Goldfarb on Ringing the Opening Bell at Nasdaq
by | May 20, 2024
Decades ago, Goldfarb's father rang the opening bell for his G-III Apparel Group, an American clothing company that designs, manufactures, markets, and sells women's and men's apparel with a global portfolio of licensed, owned, and private label brands. Today, the executive chairman of Irving-based Sow Good carried on the family tradition by ringing the opening bell at Nasdaq in New York's Times Square with Co-Founder and CEO Claudia Goldfarb and their team.
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The Last Word: Social Impact Architects’ Suzanne Smith on ‘Radical Accountability’ for Nonprofits
by | May 17, 2024
The latest Edelman Trust Barometer revealed a troubling trend: trust is at all-time low, and nonprofits have lost their position as the most trusted institution in the United States. This finding was the impetus for Dallas-based Suzanne Smith, Founder and CEO of Social Impact Architects, to write a blog post calling for nonprofits to demonstrate "radical accountability."
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