On Juneteenth, Notley, a philanthropic organization, published an open letter on racial justice from the Austin tech community.
Some of the locally-based tech companies signing the letter include Silicon Labs, WP Engine, Data.World, SailPoint, and others.
“The purpose of the
letter is to commit Austin’s tech community to action against racism,”
according to a news release. “Notley’s hope is that this gives the tech
community concrete steps they can take in the fight against structural bias and
racism in the workplace.”
In Texas, Juneteenth has been a state holiday since 1980. And this year, many tech startups like Data.World declared the date, June 19th, as a company holiday. Other larger tech companies like Tesla also made that declaration. And U.S. Senators enter a bill on Friday to declare Juneteenth a national holiday, according to NBC News.
Juneteenth commemorates the end of slavery in the United States. It dates back to 1865 when the Union soldiers landed in Galveston with news that the war had ended and enslaved were now free. That news came nearly two and a half years after President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation.
The City of Austin allowed artists to paint Congress Avenue with the statement “Black Austin Matters” earlier this week. Artists also painted “Black Artists Matter” on the street on Austin’s East Side.
Earlier this month, thousands rallied at Huston-Tillotson University in East Austin to demand an end to racism and to condemn police violence, according to a KUT story. The rally occurred after more than a week of protests in Austin.
The Notley letter outlines steps tech leaders can take to advance racial justice. The companies signing the letter pledge to move beyond words and to take action. The actions include:
Listening to our Black employees and investing time and money to support them in ways they request support
Requiring all recruiters to complete training on identifying and removing bias from the hiring process
Providing all employees with regular opportunities to engage in racial justice education and action
Providing all employees with as much paid time off as they need to exercise their voting rights on Election Day each year
Partnering with local nonprofits and universities to build a pipeline of future Black hires
Identifying and working with Black-owned businesses to supply our vendor needs and build wealth in the Black community
Financially supporting organizations that address racial disparities in the criminal justice system
Financially supporting organizations that address voter suppression in Texas
A
proposed $1 billion Tesla Gigafactory in Austin is coming closer to reality.
Next
Tuesday, the Travis County Commissioners Court will consider offering a ten-year
80 percent property tax abatement worth an estimated $14.65 million as an incentive
to have the electric vehicle manufacturing plant locate in Austin.
An
item on the agenda lists the Travis County Economic Development Performance
Agreement, proposed with the Colorado River Project, with Tesla, detailing the scope
of the project being considered.
The
electric vehicle manufacturing plant will have one or more product lines totaling
four to five million square feet resulting in a $1 billion investment in new
construction and business personal property, according to the document.
Tesla plans to begin construction next month pending all required approvals, according to its application for a tax abatement with the Del Valle Independent School District, filed with the Texas Comptrollers Office in May, and amended this week. Construction is expected to take two to three years. Tesla is seeking additional incentives from the Del Valle Independent School District.
Tesla’s
Gigafactory will create 5,000 new jobs with about 65 percent in the
construction industry paying $15 an hour. The plant’s jobs will have an average
annual salary of $47,147 with full benefits, according to the filing with the
Texas County Commissioners. But in its filing with the Del Valle ISD, Tesla
reports the jobs will pay an average annual wage of $74,050.
The plant is proposed to be located on 2,100 acres at SH 130 and Harold Green Road. It’s currently a sand and gravel site owned by Martin Marietta. It houses a concrete batch plant that serves local construction projects. That plant would operate for a while and then be relocated, according to Tesla’s application. Tesla plans to pay $5.3 million for the various parcels of land, which are under contract, according to its filing with the Texas Comptroller’s Office.
Tesla’s
plant is expected to have a ripple effect beyond the plant itself creating an
additional 4,000 new non-Tesla jobs and more than $425 million in new
annual wages above and beyond Tesla employee wages, according to the economic
impact report prepared for the Travis County Commissioners.
The
project comes at a much-needed time for Austin. The COVID-19 Pandemic has
resulted in the city’s unemployment rate skyrocketing from 2.2 percent in April
2019 to 12.4 percent in April 2020, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of
St. Louis.
The
approval of state and local incentives is essential for Texas to be considered
for the project, according to Tesla’s application. Texas has high property and
personal taxes compared to other states and the incentives would help to level
the playing field between Texas and other states vying for the project,
according to Tesla. The current focus for Tesla is on Texas and Oklahoma, but
the Texas site meets all of Tesla’s needs, pending the approval of incentives,
according to Tesla’s application with the Texas Comptroller.
Tesla, which is based in Palo Alto, California, already has a factory in Fremont, California, and Gigafactories in Nevada and New York and a Gigafactory in Shanghai, China with plans for a new one in Berlin, Germany.
Correction: Tesla has $5.3 million of land parcels under contract.
Carla Piñeyro Sublett, Chief Marketing Officer of NI Courtesy photo
National Instruments, founded in 1976, and one of Austin’s oldest homegrown technology companies, this week announced plans to rebrand to NI.
The
company unveiled its new logo and launched a brand campaign with the slogan “Engineer
Ambitiously.”
It also launched Perspectives, an online news site with a message from NI CEO Eric Starkloff. NI is a publicly-traded company with more than $1 billion in annual revenues, and 7,700 employees, of which 2,200 are based in Austin.
Carla Piñeyro Sublett, the company’s chief marketing officer, talks about the changes underfoot at NI in the latest edition of the Ideas to Invoices podcast. She joined the company a year ago, after taking a year off to travel the world with her family in search of Ubuntu, a quality that includes the essential human virtues; compassion and humanity.
That experience led her to take the job at NI and to focus on showcasing the humans behind the technology at NI. It’s the first time in the company’s history that it has had a Chief Marketing Officer. Previously, Sublett was Chief Marketing Officer at Rackspace and also worked in leadership roles at Dell.
“I
was brought to NI to help modernize the brand,” Sublett said. She soon realized
the entire test and measurement industry needed to be modern. And that’s what they’ve
been working on.
NI’s
slogan is “Engineer Ambitiously” is about bold and creative problem solving,
Sublett said.
“I think a lot of times folks don’t realize engineers are amazing problem solvers,” Sublett said. “And engineer ambitiously is something that can apply to anybody.”
NI is in the test and measurement industry.
“And so to explain that pretty much anything that has a mechanical outcome needs to be tested and measured whether that’s the car you drive in, the plane you fly on, the phone you use are some really simple and basic examples, has to be tested and measured before it can be put out to the world,” Sublett said.
That’s
where NI operates it enables engineers to test and measure products with its
software and its hardware.
“In
its simplest terms, we joke that we make stuff that makes stuff work,” Sublett
said.
NI customers are solving some of the world’s biggest problems such as solutions for clean energy, autonomous vehicles, and space missions.
At NI, we engineer ambitiously. That’s why we are dedicated to helping engineers, enterprises, and forward thinkers thrive today, tomorrow, and for the next hundred years. https://www.ni.com/en-us/perspectives/a-letter-from-eric-starkloff.html #EngineerAmbitiously, #STEAM, #STEM, #engineering, #stemcareers
NI is primarily focused on semiconductors, the automotive space, aerospace and engineering, and electronics, Sublett said.
In the podcast, Sublett also talks about how recent events like the Black Lives Matter movement and the Pandemic have shaped the company. NI recently made a donation to Notley Tide in response to the Black Lives Matter movement and is reaching out to historically black colleges and universities to increase its workforce diversity, she said.
For more, listen to the entire podcast, pasted below, or wherever you get your podcasts – available on Google play store, Apple iTunes, Spotify, PlayerFM, Libsyn, and more.
Correction: This post has been updated to clarify that NI made a donation to Notley Tide in response to the Black Lives Matter movement.
Editor’s note: Silicon Hills News is on Patreon. Please visit the site to pledge just $1 a month to support the Ideas to Invoices podcast and other work we do at SiliconHillsNews.com. Thank you in advance for your support!
Masks soon will be mandatory for employees and customers of
businesses in Austin and San Antonio.
On Wednesday, Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff issued an executive order requiring all businesses providing goods or services directly to the public to develop and implement a health and safety policy within five days.
At a minimum, the policy must require employees to wear face
masks.
If the businesses don’t comply, they may be fined $1,000 for
each violation.
In addition, everyone 10 years or older must wear a cloth face covering their nose and mouth when in public. And it is recommended that everyone two years or older wear a mask. Face masks may include homemade masks, scarfs, bandanas, or a handkerchief.
Governor Greg Abbott issued an executive order mandating that cities could not require citizens to wear face masks. But Texas allows cities to regulate businesses and that’s where Bexar County Judge Wolff found a workaround.
Also, on Wednesday, Mayor Steve Adler in Austin followed suit. He also issued an executive order requiring all businesses to develop and implement a health and safety policy and to require employees and customers to wear face masks.
San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg issued a similar order to the one issued by Bexar County Judge Wolff.
The moves by Central Texas leaders follow a sharp rise in
COVId-19 infections following Gov. Abbott’s move to reopen the Texas economy.
San Antonio and Bexar County now have 5,142 cases of people
infected with COVID-19 with 2,348 of those people already recovered. It has
recorded 90 deaths from COVID-19.
San Antonio has 241 patients hospitalized, 91 in the ICU, 43
are on ventilators, according to Mayor Nirenberg.
Austin and Travis County now have 4,991 cases of people
testing positive for COVID-19 with 3,817 people recovered and 108 deaths. There
are 173 people in hospitals with 63 in the ICU and 26 on ventilators.
“The progress we made in flattening Austin’s curve is
evaporating,” according to Mayor Steve Adler.
In his nightly Facebook live broadcast, Mayor Adler talked
about the latest executive order requiring businesses, employees and customers
to wear face masks. He cited research on the benefits of face masks in
preventing the spread of COVID-19 led by a Texas A&M researcher. Another
study by the University of Cambridge shows “Widespread facemask use could
shrink the “R” number and prevent a second COVID-19 wave.”
Earlier this week, Mayor Adler extended the shelter in place
order for Austin until August 15th. It was set to expire on June 15th.
Texas overall has seen a huge increase in COVID-19 cases
since the reopening of the Texas economy.
On April 27th, when Gov. Abbott announced plans to reopen the Texas economy. Texas had 25,297 cases of people testing positive for COVID-19 and 663 deaths. On Wednesday, Texas has 96,335 cases of people testing positive for COVID-19 and 2,062 deaths. Texas estimates 62,368 people have recovered.
The U.S. has nearly 2.2 million cases of people with COVID-19 resulting in 117,717 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University which has been tracking the disease. Worldwide there have been 8.3 million cases resulting in 448,958 deaths.
But now is the time to look for the Silver Lining and opportunities and solutions from entrepreneurs and innovation, according to Christy Cardenas, managing partner of Austin-based Ecliptic Capital, a venture capital firm focused on early-stage investing.
Cardenas recently published a 42-page report on “The Silver Lining” outlining the problems revealed by the COVID-19 pandemic and extolling entrepreneurship, private and public partnerships, and innovation as the way to create jobs and build better companies.
“This is the culmination of a storm that has been brewing for decades,” Cardenas writes in the report. “We are dealing in a situation of record proportions – a record asset bubble, record debt bubble, all fueled by a long period of easy money. We stand today as a nation divided, with economic strain driving us toward populism. Global tensions are high. Coronavirus has exacerbated an already tense status quo, driving unprecedented unemployment and triggering a global recession.”
In this episode of the Ideas to Invoices podcast, Cardenas talks about how Austin and Texas are well-positioned to be leaders in the new economy.
“There is so much news and information out there hitting us, and
it is also fragmented,” Cardenas said. “And it can be really hard to understand
what’s going on. And so, what we really
tried to do with the report is to use data to bridge the gap between truth and
perception when it comes to the economy.”
Also, with a lot of negative information out there and fear
surrounding the Pandemic, Ecliptic Capital wanted to focus on the solution,
Cardenas said.
“And get everybody thinking about what positive can come out of
this, because I really do believe it’s a huge opportunity for us just to all come
together and work together toward a better way.”
Before the Silver Lining report, Cardenas had written another
report outlining the problem with a lack of venture capital funding in Texas.
Investors in Texas historically have been focused on oil and gas and real
estate, Cardenas said. Texas does not have enough venture capital fueling
innovation here, she said.
“That is just simply a function of the fact that the capital markets
can be slow to move,” Cardenas said.
Eighty-five percent of the venture capital across the U.S. is in
invested in three states: California, New York and Massachusetts, Cardenas
said.
“We need, particularly in light of COVID and all the economic
issues that we’re facing, a nationwide innovation engine,” Cardenas said.
The world has changed with information technology and the digital economy, Cardenas said.
“Things are moving so fast and technological advances are
displacing jobs quicker than ever and COVID just kind of lit a fire on that rope,”
she said.
Cardenas grew up in New Braunfels and graduated from the University of Texas at Austin and did oil and gas investment banking once she graduated. In 2009, she worked in New York for Citigroup, and even though the credit and equity markets were locked up from the last recession, this whole unconventional shale revolution was going on, Cardenas said.
“Energy was white-hot and a lot of that has happened here in Texas,” she said.
Texas was making big advances in diversifying the economy and then from 2005 to 2010, Texas struck black gold again and the shale revolution redirected the focus back to oil and gas, Cardenas said. And while Texans have made a lot of money in the oil and gas industry, now is the time to refocus on the digital economy, Cardenas said.
Texas does have a wildcatter and risk-taking spirit that is very
independent and entrepreneurial, Cardenas said.
“That is the message we’re trying to communicate to Texas,” she
said.
Texas has a huge economy, major research institutions,
research and development, talent, and all the right ingredients for making a
strong innovation economy, Cardenas said.
“But we just have this disconnect where the capital is not here,” she said.
For more, listen to the entire podcast, pasted below, or wherever you get your podcasts – available on Google play store, Apple iTunes, Spotify, PlayerFM, Libsyn, and more.
Editor’s note: Silicon Hills News is on Patreon. Please visit the site to pledge just $1 a month to support the Ideas to Invoices podcast and other work we do at SiliconHillsNews.com. Thank you in advance for your support!
By SUSAN LAHEY Special Contributor to Silicon Hills News
Austin’s accelerators and incubators are starting to have events in person again, after months of moving everything online.
Capital Factory hosted a May Startup Showcase Tuesday at its offices, with 48 people signed up to attend. It might have been the first local startup gathering to take place in person since the COVID-19 lockdown. But other organizations seem to be in no hurry to move their events offline, and some have even found some unexpected benefits to the “new normal.”
Sandy West, Austin Technology Incubator’s director of communications, media, and partnerships, acknowledges she misses human interactions and finds back-to-back Zoom meetings exhausting. On the other hand, she said, stuff is getting done. ATI, like other incubators and accelerators, already used advanced videoconferencing technology to interact with entrepreneurs and investors around the world. Pushing more meetings into the virtual realm created a lot of efficiencies. For example, ATI was involved in the EarthXE-CapitalVirtual Summit in Dallas recently. Normally, West said, the summit was able to facilitate fewer than 100 meetings. This year, however, the 83 investors and 88 companies engaged in 303 meetings.
“I do think being face-to-face physically is so important,”
West said. “But I have a lot more trust that we can absolutely do our business,
support our incubating companies, almost more efficiently from the virtual
space.”
Getting down to business
Techstars’ Amos Schwartzfarb, photo by John Davidson
Amos Schwartzfarb, managing director of Techstars Austin, said
he loves the dynamic social environment of Austin; but having events is a bonus
to what they do, not the focus.
“Our job isn’t to give (the entrepreneurs) a social
environment; our job is to help them build a great business,” he said.
At Techstars, for example, demo days are a time to celebrate
the completion of a program with those in your cohort and they give
entrepreneurs an opportunity to hone their pitches. Since Schwartzfarb started
his program a little early this spring, his group’s demo day happened early,
just days before the stay-at-home orders came. Other Techstars demo days had to
be virtual. But while these events are good community builders, he said,
Techstars no longer invites investors. Out of 10 pitches at such an event, he
said, a given investor might only be interested in one company. And there are
hundreds of such events for investors to attend.
Rather Techstars focuses on making introductions, seeing
building relationships as key to the program. One impact of COVID-19,
Schwartzfarb said, has been to clear away anything that isn’t critical, which
may sharpen Austin’s entrepreneurial focus.
“The expectation that anybody with an idea and a tiny bit of traction can raise a seed round and fund a round that’s worth funding,” has gone by the wayside in this economy, Schwartzfarb said. “It forces people to be really resourceful. It supports positive economics, data and metrics-driven. It forces people to tell their story with math instead of theater.”
Even when social distancing is over, Schwartzfarb said,
there are some new habits he hopes to keep as part of the program. For example,
since they are not working in the same office, his team has been meeting
virtually every Monday for a 20-minute a standup. Each meeting is led by a
different person with a different topic. It goes beyond what they previously
talked about, such as ‘what are you working on now?’ and gets everyone working
together collectively. Schwartzfarb wants to make that a regular practice for
their team.
Pivoting for change
When the world suddenly shifts, it’s a good thing to know
how to pivot. For ATI, one of their pivots has been to make virtual meetings
special by sending goody bags to participants—sending lunch to someone’s home,
for example, for what traditionally would have been a luncheon event.
This might particularly be especially good for an incubator like SKU where the companies are all making goodies all the time.
“Like a lot of businesses, COVID forced us to pivot our program online – from our classes to our mentor meetings to our live pitch events,” Kirstin Ross, managing director of SKU, said in an emailed statement. “Although we love celebrating in person, the SKU Showcase video provides our founders with even more exposure to investors, retail buyers, and other CPG industry professionals from around the country. People might not be able to sample the products, but they will get a real taste of the companies and the founders.”
Many entrepreneurs are choosing to pivot, too. West said Re:3D pivoted to making facemasks and is assisting people around the world with their 3D printers in doing the same. Big Wheelbarrow, which eases supply chain headaches that prevent retailers from selling local products, launched an emergency food network. West said ATI was getting ready to announce a consortium with the University of Texas to help tackle some of the issues raised by the pandemic.
While the world waits for the pandemic danger to pass—a period that scientists say could be a more than a year from now—untold opportunities could arise that will inspire new companies to invent things that make the world better and safer in the future. One day, West said, we’ll go back to having big conferences and happy hours. People need to share the energy of being in each other’s physical space. Austin’s startup community has the chance to do some good in the meantime.
Five
years ago, a big storm knocked down a tree in Steve Cody’s neighborhood in
Ottawa, Canada.
His
neighbor, Bruce Linton cut up the tree with his chainsaw, but he needed a
bigger chainsaw to complete the job.
That’s when Cody and Linton came up with the idea for Ruckify, which bills itself as the world’s largest peer to peer rental platform. They wanted to borrow or rent a bigger chainsaw from a neighbor nearby. Both worked at different companies at the time, but they kept thinking about the idea and put it on the back burner. In June of 2017, they decided to pursue it and they spent the next few years building the software and other tools for Ruckify.
Next,
Ruckify did some market tests and identified 30 cities, including 24 cities in
the U.S., to build supply and initially put half a million products on the
platform. Today, Ruckify has more items than that on its platform, Cody said.
On
this episode of the Ideas to Invoices podcast, Cody talks about how Ruckify
launched into Austin in March right as the Covid-19 Pandemic hit and how the
company has managed to expand despite troubling times.
Cody
previously built and sold six rental companies and a software company. Ruckify
Co-Founder Linton is also a serial entrepreneur who founded Canopy Growth, one
of the world’s largest cannabis businesses.
Murillo Torres, Business Development Nancy Cody, People Operations and Steve Cody, Co-Founder & CEO, photo courtesy of Ruckify
In
March, Ruckify planned to move its headquarters to Austin and launch nationally
on March 21st.
“A
huge part of our mission is actually the environmental aspect,” Cody said. “So,
if we can get the world sharing that means the world is not going to be making
as many things, which is going to have a huge impact on the environment.”
One
of the leading cities in North America committed to protecting the environment
is Austin and that’s what led Ruckify to choose the city along with Austin’s
tech base, younger demographics and adoption of the sharing economy, Cody said.
“A
bunch of us had bought one-way tickets and we had started hiring people in
Austin,” Cody said. Ruckify also rented a temporary office and it was looking
for a permanent office to move into, he said. And then, on March 12th,
everything started getting a little weird, and on March 13th some of
the members of Ruckify went back to Canada to shelter in place, he said.
Ruckify Adapts and Changes as a Result of the Covid-19 Pandemic
Ruckify
also had a $700,000 marketing budget set aside to spend over six months, the
company has spent close to half of that, Cody said. Ruckify took out ads on
Austin Metropolitan buses. But Ruckify decided not to spend the rest of the
marketing dollars, because with the Pandemic, all of sudden people started coming
to its platform looking for a way to make money and save money, Cody said.
Ruckify’s business model shifted, he said.
The
company was spending $200,000 a month on advertising before the Pandemic, and
since March, it has spent about $10,000 and its business is better than ever,
Cody said.
“It
became a lot more organic in terms of building the business,” Cody said. “We
found a different purpose, I think, a clearer purpose.”
Ruckify
had 81 people at the start of the Pandemic on March 12th. Unfortunately,
on March 16th, Ruckify had to let half its team go, Cody said. Since
then, Ruckify has been able to hire back 12 of the people it let go and it’s
continuing to hire back people, Cody said.
“Where
we are today, we never modeled things going so well,” Cody said.
Today,
Ruckify uses Zoom, Google Hangouts, Slack and other online tools to work
remotely as a team. It has gone so well, Cody said, Ruckify will continue to
allow its employees to work remotely even after the Pandemic and threat of Covid-19
passes, he said.
“I don’t see us going back to an office,” Cody said. “Our company is run better now. We have to run more through process and culture is very much intact.”
Remote
working allows for more flexibility and quality of life for employees, Cody
said. Each employee is an owner of the company and that provides an incentive
to do a good job, he said.
Ruckify Becomes a Side Hustle for People to Make Extra Money
People
use Ruckify for three reasons: to foster community, to lessen their impact on
the environment, and to make money or save money, Cody said. Ruckify makes
money on each rental transaction, taking a 10 percent cut, and another 10
percent if you want insurance on the item, he said. But Ruckify has suspended
collecting fees until the end of June to help support people through Covid-19,
he said. People can post as many items for rent in their “stores” online and
Ruckify doesn’t charge a fee for that, he said.
Ruckify
allows its members to rent out anything they own to others in their area
including lawnmowers, books, video games, musical instruments, even RVs, but
during the pandemic some of the most popular items are weights, treadmills,
exercise bikes, Cody said. The platform also does really well with renting out niche
items like an egg incubator or a water bed pump, he said.
Ruckify
also offers webinars to teach people how to operate a rental shop on the
platform as a side hustle. Some people make between $700 and $1,000 a month
renting out their stuff on Ruckify, Cody said.
To
date, Ruckify has raised $17.5 million in angel investment from high net worth
individuals and family offices. The company planned to do a listing on the
Nasdaq stock market this year, and it may still go forward with those plans,
Cody said.
“Tough times are good times for the rental industry,” Cody said. “The rental industry was literally created in the Great Depression and Airbnb was started by the last recession.”
For more, listen to the entire podcast, pasted below or wherever you get your podcasts – available on Google play store, Apple iTunes, Spotify, PlayerFM, Libsyn, and more.
Editor’s note: Silicon Hills News is on Patreon. Please visit the site to pledge just $1 a month to support the Ideas to Invoices podcast and other work we do at SiliconHillsNews.com. Thank you in advance for your support!
As COVID-19 cases continue to rise, Texas is moving to further open its economy allowing childcare centers, massage centers, tattoo and body piercing studios and more to resume operations effective Monday, according to Governor Greg Abbott.
And on Friday, bars, wine tasting centers, craft beer establishments, bowling alleys, skating centers, zoos, aquariums, rodeos, and more will be able to open as part of Texas’ Phase II opening of its economy, Abbott said.
“I want you to know this, today, tomorrow and every day going forward is one day closer to medical discoveries that will help treat and protect people from getting COVID-19, until that day comes, our focus is to keep you safe while also restoring your ability to get back to work, to open your businesses, to pay your bills, to put food on your tables,” Abbott said during an afternoon press conference that was broadcast online by KXAN. “But let’s be clear, COVID-19 it still exists in Texas, our goal is to find ways to coexist with COVID-19 as safely as possible.”
That includes continuing these safe practices that people have already adopted like maintaining safe distances, wearing a mask, and sanitizing hands, Abbott said.
“It is a fact that these safe practices save lives,” Abbott
said.
Already, effective Monday, business offices can reopen with up to ten employees or 25 percent of its workforce as long as they maintain safe distancing and other practices designed to curb the spread of the COVID-19 virus. Manufacturing operations are also allowed to resume with 25 percent occupancy and other guidelines.
And beginning May 31st, Texas will allow summer day and overnight camps to reopen along with professional sports such as basketball, baseball, car racing, football, golf, softball, and tennis leagues without spectators.
Most of the major COVID-19 outbreaks in Texas have occurred at nursing homes, jails, and meatpacking plants, Abbott said. And that is what accounts for the spike in COVID-19 cases in the Amarillo area, he said.
There are now 2,129 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Potter
County with Amarillo as its largest city. That ranks the county fifth in Texas
behind Travis County with 2,425 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and ahead of Bexar
County with 2,120 cases.
Overall, Texas has 47,784 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and
the state estimates 27,570 people have recovered from the disease. There have
been 1,336 deaths from COVID-19 reported as of Monday.
People over the age of 65 make up most of the deaths in
Texas and moving forward, it is recommended that seniors stay at home as much
as possible, Abbott said.
As the state has opened up for Texas, the state has ample
supplies of protective personal equipment and its testing has also increased,
Abbott said.
Based on input from data and doctors, Gov. Abbott said it is
now time to take the next steps to resume economic activity in Texas.
Texas is allowing restaurants to increase capacity to 50
percent total occupancy starting on Friday. They had previously operated at 25
percent capacity. Restaurants are required to maintain at least six feet of
distance from other parties at all times including while waiting to be seated
in the restaurant. They also cannot have tables of more than six people and
they must have hand sanitizing stations available upon entry to the restaurant.
Since May 8th, barbershops, hair salons, nail shops, tanning salons, and other businesses have been allowed to operate at 25 percent capacity. Gyms and exercise facilities were allowed to reopen Monday with a reduced capacity of 25 percent with lockers and shower rooms closed, but restrooms are allowed to remain open.
And summer school can resume as soon as June 1st as long as they follow safe distancing guidelines, Abbott said.
“As we open up, we must continue to place health and safety
at the forefront,” Abbott said.
Texas is putting a temporary pause on certain counties that are not allowed to begin Phase II until May 29th and that includes El Paso, Potter, Randall, Moore, and Deaf Smith counties, he said.
“Texans have always faced adversity and they have always
prevailed,” Abbott said.
Texas’ fatality rate is one of the lowest in America, he
said.
“We are getting through this, but now more than ever we need to work together,” Abbott said.
For a full list of the businesses allowed to open and the restrictions placed upon them visit the Open Texas website here.
Everlywell received authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for its COVID-19 Test Home Collection Kit.
The FDA sent out a news release Saturday reporting that Austin-based Everlywell’s home collection kit is currently the only authorized COVID-19 diagnostic testing kit the FDA has approved.
The government regulator issued an emergency use authorization (EUA) to Everlywell allowing the company to provide the kit to people by prescription only.
Initially, Everlywell reported it would begin providing at-home tests for COVID-19 to people on March 23rd. But it ran into a snag as the FDA reported it had not approved any home tests.
Now, it has.
“The authorization of a COVID-19 at-home collection kit that can
be used with multiple tests at multiple labs not only provides increased
patient access to tests, but also protects others from potential exposure,” Jeffrey
Shuren, M.D., J.D., director of the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological
Health, said in a news release. “Today’s action is also another great example
of public-private partnerships in which data from a privately funded study was
used by industry to support an EUA request, saving precious time as we continue
our fight against this pandemic.”
Everlywell will
collect at-home samples from people and then process them at specified
laboratories for COVID-19 diagnostic testing. The kits are only authorized to
be used by people who have been screened using an online questionnaire that is
reviewed by a health care provider.
Everlywell’s self-collection kit contains nasal swabs to collect
a sample and a tube filled with saline to transport the sample back to a
specified lab.
To use the at-home test, a person needs to collect a specimen using the swab. Then they ship the sample overnight to a certified lab.
Everlywell is working Fulgent Therapeutics and Assurance
Scientific Laboratories to process the specimens. The lab results
will be provided through telemedicine by Everlywell’s physician network and its
online portal.
Everlywell previously stated the tests would cost $135.
To
get approval for the COVID-19 test, Everlywell drew on existing data and studies,
supported by The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and UnitedHealth Group, to
show the specimens would remain stable during shipping.
“The data from these studies are freely available to support other EUA requests, alleviating each test developer of the burden of recreating the same study,” according to the FDA.
Everlywell, founded in 2015 by Julia Cheek, makes and sells 35 home lab testing kits for sexual health, thyroid, metabolism, men’s health, and other health needs. It sells the kits online and at retail stores like CVS and Target.
Last April, Everlywell landed $50 million in venture capital funding. The company has raised $55 million to date.
The deal provides small and mid-sized businesses a 40 percent discount on Invoiced’s accounts receivable software for two years.
Customers must sign up for a subscription plan by March 12,
2022.
American Express through the partnership is expected to play
an important role in how Invoiced scales its business, said Adam Weinroth, the
company’s Chief Marketing Officer.
“It has the potential to be a game-changer,” he said.
The partnership with American Express was already underway
before the Pandemic, Weinroth said. He had visited with American Express
representatives in New York before the shelter in place orders went into
effect, he said.
“Due to the Pandemic and how it can affect business for
SMEs, the importance of this kind of solution has intensified,” he said.
Invoiced has 10 employees and is hiring five more by the end
the year, Weinroth said.
Right now, Invoiced’s employees are working from home, Weinroth said. They are following the latest City of Austin and Travis County’s Shelter in Place order, which was extended until May 30th. The company had recently moved out Capital Factory to its own 2,500 square-foot headquarters off Southwest Parkway.
