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8 prestigious Texas colleges score top rankings for entrepreneurship

University of Texas at Dallas scores a place on the list.

Texas is home to some the best business and entrepreneurship programs in the country, according to an annual report.

Princeton Review and Entrepreneur magazine ranked Houston's Rice University as the No. 1 graduate entrepreneurship program in the United States for 2022, and the University of Houston claimed the top spot on the undergraduate ranking. Both lists ranked the top 50 programs.

While UH and Rice held the top spots, several other Texas schools saw some movement on the lists this year. These Texas schools appeared on the list of the top 50 undergraduate entrepreneurship programs, including a couple in Dallas-Fort Worth:

The University of Texas at Austin, No. 4 (up from No. 24 last year)
Baylor University, No. 9 (down from No. 7 last year)
Texas Tech University, No. 12
University of Texas at Dallas, No. 24 (down from No. 18 last year)
Texas Christian University, No. 37 (down from No. 27 last year)
Texas A&M University-College Station, No. 41 (down from No. 35 last year)

Aside from Rice, these Texas schools made the list of the top 50 graduate entrepreneurship programs:

University of Texas at Austin, McCombs School of Business, No. 5 (up from No. 6 last year)
University of Texas at Dallas, Naveen Jindal School of Management, No. 11 (down from No. 10 last year)
Texas A&M University-College Station, Mays School of Business, No. 26 (same as last year)

The Princeton Review based its 2022 rankings on a survey of leaders at over 300 schools with entrepreneurship studies. More than 40 data points were factored in to develop the rankings, which were released online on November 16 and will be published in the December issue of Entrepreneur magazine.

"The value of entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial thinking continues to grow in our daily lives," says Jason Feifer, editor in chief of Entrepreneur magazine, in the press release. "We're now seeing Americans start businesses at the fastest rate in a decade. By sharing this list, we want to continue to provide the much-needed information that people are looking for to forge their path to entrepreneurship. This list is a valuable reference tool for where future leaders can attain the knowledge, community and training grounds to succeed on that path."

It's the third No. 1 ranking for Jones Graduate School of Business at Rice University — and the sixth year in the top three and the 13th year in which it has ranked in the top 10 on this prestigious list. The program's graduates have raised more than $693 million in funding for their companies over the past five years, per the report.

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A version of this story originally appeared on our sister site InnovationMap.

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Artificial Intelligence News

Google to invest $40 billion on AI data centers in Texas

Google

Google data center

Google is investing a huge chunk of money in Texas: According to a release, the company will invest $40 billion on cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, with the development of new data centers in Armstrong and Haskell Counties.

The company announced its intentions at a meeting on November 14 attended by federal, state, and local leaders including
Governor Greg Abbott who called it "a Texas-sized investment."

Other attendees included Deputy Secretary of Energy James Danly, Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas), Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas), and Congressman Jake Ellzey (R-TX 06), Haskell County Judge Kenny Thompson, Armstrong County Judge Adam Ensey, Red Oak Mayor Mark Stanfill, and Midlothian Mayor Justin Coffman.

Google will open two new data center campuses in Haskell County, and a data center campus in Armstrong County.

Additionally, the first building at the company’s Red Oak campus in Ellis County is now operational. Google is continuing to invest in its existing Midlothian campus and Dallas cloud region, which are part of the company’s global network of 42 cloud regions that deliver high-performance, low-latency services that businesses and organizations use to build and scale their own AI-powered solutions.

Energy demands
Google is committed to responsibly growing its infrastructure by bringing new energy resources onto the grid, paying for costs associated with its operations, and supporting community energy efficiency initiatives.

One of the new Haskell data centers will be co-located with — or built directly alongside — a new solar and battery energy storage plant, creating the first industrial park to be developed through Google’s partnership with Intersect and TPG Rise Climate announced last year.

Google has contracted to add more than 6,200 megawatts (MW) of net new energy generation and capacity to the Texas electricity grid through power purchase agreements (PPAs) with energy developers such as AES Corporation, Enel North America, Intersect, Clearway, ENGIE, SB Energy, Ørsted, and X-Elio.

Water demands
Google’s three new facilities in Armstrong and Haskell Counties will use air-cooling technology, limiting water use to site operations like kitchens. The company is also contributing $2.6 million to help Texas Water Trade create and enhance up to 1,000 acres of wetlands along the Trinity-San Jacinto Estuary. Google is also sponsoring a regenerative agriculture program with Indigo Ag in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and an irrigation efficiency project with N-Drip in the Texas High Plains.

Google is committing $7 million in grants to support AI-related initiatives in healthcare, energy, and education across the state. This includes helping CareMessage enhance rural healthcare access; enabling The University of Texas at Austin and Texas Tech University to address energy challenges that will arise with all this new AI stuff, and expanding AI training for Texas educators and students through support to Houston City College.

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