🔥 What’s hot in Houston’s innovation scene this week?

6/22/26 - 6/28/26

In partnership with

Everything GTM. One platform.

Small teams don't have time to stitch together five tools and hope it works.

Apollo gives you everything you need to find leads, reach them, and close deals — all in one place:

  • 230M+ verified contacts

  • AI-powered outreach

  • Data enrichment

  • Inbound lead capture

  • Meeting scheduler

  • And more

Stop juggling tools and start building pipeline that scales.

With Apollo, the AI revenue engine powering 4M+ users.

Howdy Rocket Networkers,

I’m stoked that Apollo is sponsoring this issue.

So let me show you the exact workflow they power for me. The one that feels like a cheat code.

Here's the problem with networking.

You meet someone great at a meetup.

You have a real conversation.

And then you get home, and their name is just... gone.

The follow-up never happens. The relationship dies before it starts.

I got tired of that. So I built a skill called gtm-linkedin-to-crm (if you have HubSpot, Claude and Apollo, you can download it by clicking on the link).

Here's what it does.

I give it a LinkedIn profile. Screenshot, URL, doesn't matter.

It reads the profile. Name, title, company.

Apollo enriches it. Email, phone, job title, company details. All of it.

Then it writes everything into HubSpot. Creates the contact. Creates the company. Links them together.

I don't touch a spreadsheet. I don't copy. I don't paste.

I just say to Claude: "add this person to HubSpot" and drop in a screenshot.

That's it.

Ten minutes of busywork, gone. Replaced by one sentence.

Spend your energy on the conversation, not the data entry that comes after.

- oleg 👊

P.S. Know a Texas company doing something insane? hit reply.
Got a founder friend who needs to hear this? forward them this email. let's raise Houston's tech game together.

At Rocket Network, we do the dirty work for you, curating Houston's tech scene so you spend less time scrolling and more time building. Want to be featured or sponsor? Hit reply.

LET'S ROCKET NETWORK!

We are using emojis to guide subscribers in our event list 📅📍

🚀 - must attend

🔥🌶️ - something hot

🤓💻 - good for developers and other technical folks

🦄💰- venture capital and investing-related

- energy-related

♻️- renewable energy and sustainability-related

🏥 - health care related

🎖️🪖 - veteran or military related 

🏅 - sports tech related

₿ - web3 related


HERE ARE OUR PICKS FOR HTX THIS WEEK

Monday, June 22

URTeC - Day 1


🚀InnovateEnergy Week 2026 - Day 1 (use code -IEWEEK200OFF)

Sustainability-focused data hackathon tied to the FIFA World Cup. In-person kickoff June 23–24 at the Ion, then a virtual build through Sept 15. $10K grand prize, $17.5K in total prizes. Teams build data and visualization tools on real Houston urban datasets.

Investor insights, fireside chats, and a live founder pitch competition with a cash prize. Hosted by Scale Haus. $10 tickets, food and drinks included. Good night to practice the pitch and meet investors.

The fourth-Thursday NASA session at the Ion. This month spotlights NASA education and partnership opportunities for students, colleges, and universities, with info booths and activities. Stick around for networking after.

Friday, June 26

The flagship Friday Cup of Joey at the Ion — the anchor of the Houston founder week. Coffee, open networking, and the "what's your why" conversation.

Founders and newcomers talk traction, funding stage, ICP, and bootstrapping. Runs right after Cup of Joey at the Ion.

⚠️Hosting a tech meetup or startup event? Submit it via the RocketNetwork Event Submission Form to boost your visibility!


👉Energy Community and Energy Tech Jobs - LINK

👉The Biggest Free Remote Job Board in North America - LINK

👉Start your targeted job search today with AI - LINK

That’s a wrap for now, RocketNetworkers,

Stay tuned, and keep grinding!

❤️ - ROCKET NETWORK TEAM

Disclaimer: The content in this newsletter is for informational purposes only and does not constitute an endorsement or recommendation by any sponsors. All opinions and information are those of the author and not of the sponsors or affiliated organizations.

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