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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.
Emily Wickard, founder and CEO of Avara [Photo: Avara]
The Last Word: Avara’s Emily Wickard on Leading the Fastest-Growing e-Commerce Business in the U.S.
by David Seeley | Oct 18, 2023
in August, Dallas-based women’s fashion retailer Avara was ranked the No. 1 fastest-growing e-commerce business in the U.S. on the 2023 Inc. 5000 list. Achieving 1,089% three-year revenue growth, Wickard's company made the list for the second year in a row, Avara also ranked as the No. 4 fastest-growing women’s retailer in the nation and the 20th fastest-growing among Dallas-Fort Worth companies overall.
by David Seeley |
Oct 16, 2023
We told you last month about CannibiSenS, the hand-held rapid saliva test developed by Prasad and her team at UT Dallas. The device can measure THC levels with 94% accuracy, the team says. According to the researchers, the “electrochemical sensor” is more sensitive than over-the-counter tests, which typically can detect THC but don’t determine its concentration.
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by David Seeley |
Oct 12, 2023
In July, we wrote about Dallas-based Velvet Taco launching a new “Chat GPTaco” as part of its weekly taco feature. Now using AI to help create menu items seems to be catching on nationwide. According to Business Insider, more restaurants—from local spots to big national chains—are taking the AI plunge.
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by David Seeley |
Oct 11, 2023
On Friday, Gov. Greg Abbott addressed more than 250 CEOs, industry innovators, investors, political leaders, and military officials gathered at Circle T Ranch just outside Fort Worth for the invite-only UP.Summit. The three-day event—once described by a co-creator as “Sun Valley meets CES meets the Oshkosh Airshow meets Burning Man meets TED meets Davos“—convened minds, money, and mobility tech from across the globe.
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Fort Worth-based Cx Precision Medicine was the 2023 Impact Award winner at TechFW’s annual Impact Showcase. Shown are the company's CFO Darlene Boudreaux, CEO Danguole Altman, and Carol Berry. [Cx photo courtesy of Devan Peplow]
The Last Word: Briana Wucinski on TechFW’s Impact Showcase, and the Night’s Big Winners
by David Seeley | Oct 6, 2023
TechFW's Impact Showcase "embodied the spirit of innovation, the essence of progress, and the promise of a better tomorrow" at Dickies Arena's
Simmons Bank Pavilion Thursday in Fort Worth.
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by David Seeley |
Oct 5, 2023
Founded in Dallas in 2012, Mizzen+Main says it created the world’s first "performance fabric dress shirt" over a decade ago. Since then, the brand's flag has been flown with help from innovative marketing, like getting brand ambassador and pro golf superstar Phil Mickelson to do a "dad dance" in the company's shirt, as we noted in our story here.
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by David Seeley |
Oct 4, 2023
Duro Hospitality recently opened Mister Charles (above) in the former home of the historic Highland Park Soda Fountain in Dallas' Knox Street District. He spoke with Forbes' Benjamin Liong Setiawan about why Dallas has become an emerging food & beverage destination.
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by David Seeley |
Oct 3, 2023
Carlisle, who joined the Mark Cuban Companies in 2021 as a venture capital associate, is hosting a new podcast that launched Tuesday—and "It's Just Business." On the podcast series, Carlisle will interview founders about how they started their businesses and lessons learned along the way.
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[Photo: Low and Slow Snacks]
The Last Word: Jared Drinkwater’s Easy Sell for Low and Slow Snacks
by David Seeley | Sep 29, 2023
Drinkwater, who previously worked at Frito-Lay and as VP of national marketing at Pizza Hut, co-founded Low and Slow Snacks in 2019. The barbecue junkie told the Dallas Business Journal the idea struck when he doused a bag of corn chips in BBQ rub and smoked them in his backyard smoker—and his family gobbled them down in 30 seconds.
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by Quincy Preston |
Sep 28, 2023
With a theme of “Innovation, Capital, Collaboration, Commercialization”—or iC³—the summit unites researchers, entrepreneurs, investors, corporations, and support organizations to forge the relationships that drive progress.
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by David Seeley |
Sep 27, 2023
Rooker's firm has seen so many fraudulent property sale attempts lately—via Docusign and text messages from "fake sellers"—that it has created a fact sheet to warn clients, Rooker told April Towery of Candy's Dirt.
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by Quincy Preston |
Sep 26, 2023
Fort Worth’s newest public art installation greets residents and visitors with a bold message—to dream big, be bold, and lead on. The 70-foot mural is Texas Christian University’s capstone on its artful coast-to-coast tour celebrating TCU’s 150th anniversary.
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The Last Word: Nirav Tolia on Going from Yahoo! Employee No. 84 to Founding His Own Game-Changing Companies
by Quincy Preston | Sep 22, 2023
The tech entrepreneur and investor, who moved from the West Coast to the Dallas region in 2021, went on to found Epinions and Nextdoor after leaving Yahoo! during its meteoric rise in the late '90s. Seeing the success of the Web juggernaut firsthand—despite a blunt warning from its co-founder—gave Tolia the courage to branch out on his own.
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by David Seeley |
Sep 21, 2023
Posting on LInkedIn, the Communities Foundation of Texas shared the above photo of Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson and the Dallas City Council after the official proclamation declaring today North Texas Giving Day across the city of Dallas.
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by Quincy Preston |
Sep 20, 2023
The company's original groundbreaking HoverTouch technology has found a new use case at Sam's Club. The giant touchscreen is replacing theft-prone iPads with HoverTouch tech that turns any surface into an interactive experience — walls, glass, tables, and more become engaging consumer touchpoints with no power to the surface.
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by David Seeley |
Sep 19, 2023
The advancement, leveraging what the institute calls "Diffusion Policy," is said to improve robot utility and be a step toward building "Large Behavior Models" for robots, similar to Large Language Models like ChatGPT which have revolutionized conversational AI.
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