Pitch Party

Dallas business summit to feature college students in Shark Tank pitch

There will be no sharks nor Mark Cuban.

Photo via Wikipedia Commons

A new business summit launching in Dallas is being hailed as a dream event for entrepreneurs.

It's called "Changing The World For Good - The 2023 SMU & GSV Mission Summit," and it's a three-day event from May 22-24 with big names and big ideas.

Leading businesses, investors, educational innovators, and entrepreneurs will convene for an inspiring three days of panel discussions, creative huddles, and company presentations designed to bring business + ideas + financing together.

The event was created by GSV and builds on the tradition of an annual summit that GSV holds with Arizona State University. "GSV" stands for “Global Silicon Valley,” an investment platform that has invested in businesses such as Facebook, Twitter, Snap, Palantir, and Spotify.

In addition to host university SMU, partners in Dallas' inaugural Mission Summit include Hoque Global and American City Business Journals.

GSV’s work in Dallas also includes a partnership with Hoque Global in the development of SoGood in Downtown Dallas and an Innovation District at its core. SoGood is a master-planned urban community adjacent to the Famers Market, Deep Ellum, the Cedars, and Fair Park just south of Interstate 30.

Student pitch
One especially inspiring element of the event is The Texas Cup, a Shark Tank-like competition in which students from Texas universities will present business ideas and compete for funding.

Students will give live pitches before a panel of judges. Finals will take place Wednesday, May 24, at the Varsity room at SMU Hughes-Trigg Student Center at 3140 Dyer St, and promise to be a one-of-a-kind live event emceed by Gina Miller, FC Dallas VP of Communications.

The pitches will come from 12 finalists among 100 students who competed statewide from pretty much every DFW college or university: Dallas College, Dallas Baptist University, Paul Quinn College, SMU, Tarrant County College, Texas A&M, TCU, TWU, University of Dallas, UNT, University of Texas at Arlington, University of Texas at Dallas, and UT Southwestern.

Judges include executives from Goldman Sachs, Mt. Vernon Investments, Interlock Partners, CDX Advisors, Artemis Agency, and Hoque Global, who are co-hosting the event. They'll consider criteria such as the market, business model, the inspiration, and what kind of impact it'll have.

Three winning pitches will receive funding from SoGood by HG and GSV. Every participant will receive a free “pitch practice” session with the world’s top vocal coach, Roger Love, plus a free ticket to the Summit, and the chance to rub elbows with other mission-minded entrepreneurs.

“This is a dream event for entrepreneurs, to be able to see great ideas win support to become a reality,” says Hoque Global CEO Mike Hoque in a statement.

Participants leading the Summit include:

Clark Hunt, CEO, Kansas City Chiefs
Robert Kaplan, Former President and CEO, Federal Reserve Bank in Dallas
Avery Johnson, Partner, Avery Capital
Jennifer Chandler, Managing Director, Bank of America
Michael Sorrell, President, Paul Quinn College
Michael Moe, founder of Global Silicon Valley and
Co-Author of the best-selling The Mission Corporation
Elizabeth Loboa, Provost, Southern Methodist University
Mike Hoque, CEO, Hoque Global
Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt and Oklahoma First Lady Sarah Stitt

technology festivals

cyber commute

Frisco tops 2026 list of U.S. cities with the most remote workers

Photo by Unsplash

Remote work really is all that and a bag of chips.

North Dallas neighbor Frisco has landed atop a 2026 list of U.S. cities with the most remote workers for the second consecutive year, and an up-and-coming McKinney has surged into the top 10.

The personal finance experts at SmartAsset compared the 357 largest U.S. cities based on the percentage of people who work from home, and additionally calculated the mean commute times for non-remote workers in each city. Remote work prevalence was analyzed using U.S. Census data from 2023-2024.

The findings revealed a third of all employees based in Frisco work remotely, with more than 42,000 remote workers as of 2024. However, the city's remote work prevalence is slightly lower than it was the year before.

"Frisco remains the top city for remote work with 33.7 percent of workers aged 16 and up working from home, despite a slight decline from 34.2 percent a year earlier," the report said.

Frisco residents that don't have the privilege of working remotely spend about 27.3 minutes on average commuting to their workplaces, SmartAsset added. Over 63 percent of Frisco workers drive to their jobs, and less than one percent walk to work.

In McKinney, the prevalence of remote workers in the city surged from 24.2 percent in 2023 to 26.7 percent in 2024. The report additionally found there were 32,798 residents working remotely in McKinney in 2024.

McKinney workers also spend more time commuting than Frisco residents do. The average commute time for in-person work in the city added up to 31.8 minutes. Nearly 70 percent of workers drive to their jobs, and .69 percent report that they walk to work.

Nationally, remote work has declined as more employers push return-to-office mandates, according to SmartAsset. But new reports have indicated these mandates are backfiring as more people seek employment at companies that embrace and prioritize flexible working environments.

"Remote work can open up a lot of opportunities for employees, families, and employers alike," the report's author wrote. "However, shifts into remote work may also cause short-term challenges to some communities – such as loss or redistribution of businesses and services used by commuters."

For remote workers in Dallas-Fort Worth, there's a greater financial incentive to work remote than to commute. An April 2025 U.S. Census Bureau study determined remote workers in the Metroplex earn nearly 51 percent more than their commuting counterparts. Dallas-area remote workers made a median income of $77,000 in 2023, compared to $51,100 for other workers.

"Tradeoffs abound, tracking the evolution of work culture and where the spoils of productivity end up can provide guidance to businesses, politicians, job-seekers, and employers alike," the report said.

The top 10 U.S. cities with the most prevalent remote workforces are:

No. 1 – Frisco, Texas
No. 2 – Berkeley, California
No. 3 – Cary, North Carolina
No. 4 – Boulder, Colorado
No. 5 – Scottsdale, Arizona
No. 6 – Arlington, Virginia
No. 7 – McKinney, Texas
No. 8 – Fishers, Indiana
No. 9 – Boca Raton, Florida
No. 10 – Carlsbad, California

frisco mckinney suburbs remote work innovation smartasset