The Summer of Startups

After a summer of meeting with mentors and scaling startups, more than 10 teams presented their businesses at the RED Labs Venture Showcase on the University of Houston campus.

The summer accelerator program supports groups of University of Houston students, faculty and recent alumni as they take ideas or newly formed businesses and scale them for broader success in Houston and beyond. Throughout the weeks, the teams collaborated and used their strengths to push all their businesses forward.

“The team at Chromality made cool Instagram videos for Arlo Espresso Club,” RED Labs Managing Director Liana Gonzalez-Schulenberg said. “Robert from Simu-Life volunteered to move stuff at seven o'clock in the morning on a Saturday for Houston Pilates Club. There’s a lot of cross-pollination.”

Back for its 13^th year, RED Labs restructured the final showcase in 2026, extending pitches back to four minutes, and adding a Q&A portion for the first time ever. The event, previously called Bayou Startup Showcase, included 90 second pitches and was held in collaboration with another university.

Network

Pitch

Showcase

Through extensive practice, MBA alumni Felesia Harden and Rehkai Gibson said their public speaking skills improved while developing their business Gentive. They recommend the program as a way to broaden entrepreneurial perspectives.

“You come with your business idea, thinking it's going to go XYZ,” Harden said. “After talking to people and through customer discovery, you learn that it's okay to pivot. You’re exposed to different people, elements and ideas.”

Biomedical engineering student Robert Ozaeta didn’t enter the program with an expansive business background, however, said mentors and staff gave his team the context needed to refine their product.

“The most formative part of the experience was having people who have done this before sharing their experiences and insights,” Ozaeta said.

While participating in RED Labs, Executive Doctorate of Business Administration student Darian Jones said he was able to apply feedback in real-time toward his business Air-to-Water Generators.

“I got a lot of advice around how to scale my business up because I was hitting a roadblock with hiring people,” Jones said. “I was able to direct my questions to people who have already scaled their businesses. Now we have an engineer on board, and I have a better vision for how to grow sustainably.”

Inventor and entrepreneur Bandula Wijay was one of several people to mentor the teams. With a history of working in the medical device field, Wijay encouraged participants to reflect on the value their product can add to the business landscape.

“Several groups impressed me with what they were doing,” he said. “Some of them already had a business running with a bit of cash flow, and they needed some advice on how to make it bigger. I believe the best way to do that is to look for the need and the impact of their product.”

RED Labs and the Cyvia and Melvyn Wolff Center for Entrepreneurship host various other events to boost small businesses throughout the year. To learn more about the program, click here.