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Joshua Baer — founder of the tech investment company Capital Factory and described as the “godfather” of the Austin startup scene — died in a plane crash this week on his way back to Austin. We’re learning more about the crash, the investigation and about Baer’s larger impacts here.
Summer break is well underway for the Austin school district, but teachers and staff from 10 closing schools are thinking about life at a different campus next school year. How one math teacher made the decision to retire.
Plus: A preview of the Black Auteur Film Festival that’s happening this Saturday.
Austin Signal is made possible by listeners like you. You can support our work by making a donation at supportthispodcast.org
The full transcript of this episode of Austin Signal is available on the KUT & KUTX Studio website. The transcript is also available as subtitles or captions on some podcast apps.
Jerry Quijano [00:00:08] Joshua Baer, founder of the tech investment company Capital Factory, died in a plane crash this week on his way back to Austin. Baer was described as the godfather of the Austin startup scene, launching Capital Factory in 2009 and serving as an entrepreneur in residence here at UT Austin. We’re learning more about the crash, the investigation, and about Baer’s larger impacts here in the Austin area. We’ve got more about that coming up on today’s show.
KUT Announcer: Laurie Gallardo [00:00:33] The Austin Signal is a production of KUT News, hosted by Jerry Quijano.
Jerry Quijano [00:00:38] Summer break is well underway for the Austin School District, but teachers and staff from 10 schools across the city are thinking about life at a different campus next school year. The final story in our series of lasts, plus a preview of the Blackall Tour Film Festival that’s happening this Saturday. That is coming up next here on Austin Signal. This is Austin Signal. I’m your host, Jerry Quijano. It is Thursday, June 18th. Thank you for tuning in. Joshua Baer, founder of the Austin-based tech company Capital Factory, was killed in a plane crash on his way back to Austin late on Tuesday night. The plane crash happened in Laredo, and six people were inside the plane, according to local police. First responders took them out of the aircraft, but Baer did not survive. Here with the latest is Gabriel Velazquez-Nera. He is the breaking news reporter at KUT News. Hi Gabriel. Thanks for having me, Jerry. So we are learning details about the crash that happened this week. What do we know so far about the plane that was involved in the crash and what might have contributed to it?
Gabriel Velazquez-Nera [00:01:47] We know for a fact there was a mechanical issue with the plane. It was a charter plane owned by the company NetJets, and these types of private jets tend to have multiple flights in one day. So in this case, I think there was three flights before the eventual flight back from Mexico to Austin. I think it was Arizona, Mexico, and then another place in Mexico before making its way back to Austin, not to say that Bayer was making all of those trips, but the jet itself has a very high usage rate. And we know that it was a mechanical failure, but we don’t know which part of the plane failed.
Jerry Quijano [00:02:20] We do know that there were other passengers on the plane. What do we know so far about their conditions and their identities?
Gabriel Velazquez-Nera [00:02:27] So besides Bear, there were five other people on the plane, two of them pilots, and then three teenagers. We know that some were family friends and some were part of Bear’s family, but we don’t know how many.
Jerry Quijano [00:02:38] And the plane crashed into a highway in Laredo and eventually came to rest on a vehicle barrier. Were there any injuries?
Gabriel Velazquez-Nera [00:02:44] On the ground? So the person that did get questioned to that was driving on the highway he did go to the hospital or they went to the hospital and they have since been released. You reported your story
Jerry Quijano [00:02:54] that the National Transportation Safety Board and the FBI are looking into the crash. What have they said so far about the crash and what happens next in this investigation? So at 2 p.m. Today.
Gabriel Velazquez-Nera [00:03:05] We have, there is a press meeting basically where we’re hoping to learn more information and we’re really just waiting on that National Transportation Safety Board preliminary report. Hopefully that will give some more details on the After Effects and we are also getting the 911 calls from the Laredo Police Department.
Jerry Quijano [00:03:25] Okay, well, we will continue to follow this story and bring you the latest right here on AustinSignal and at KUT.org. We’ve been speaking with Gabriel Velázquez-Neira. He is the breaking news reporter here at Kut News. Gabriel, thank you for your time. Thank you, Jared. Bear has been called the architect of Austin’s tech scene, and the city’s startup ecosystem might not look like it does today without Bear’s venture capital firm, Capital Factory, founded in 2009. Brent Weistrom is assistant managing editor of Austin Business Journal. He got to know Bear over the years, reporting on Austin’s startup scene, and he joins us now to talk about the impact he left. Brent, thank you for being here. Yeah, thanks for having me. So, for our listener who might not be familiar, who exactly was Joshua Bayer?
Brent Weistrom [00:04:09] Cash Bear is probably the most prominent and well-known startup incubator in Austin. He launched Capital Factory years ago and put Austin on the map in terms of being a startup community and helped grow the investment ecosystem and the startup ecosystem over course of a couple decades, so it’s a long tale.
Jerry Quijano [00:04:30] Story called him the the godfather of the Austin startup scene how big how big was his impact on the local scene
Brent Weistrom [00:04:38] Tough to overstate it. Capital Factory itself invests in startups and I think is probably the most active investor in Texas. They mostly make small investments to hundreds of companies. So he’s touched like a ton of people through that investment, but he’s also a mentor. He’s a guest lecturer at the University of Texas. So he was working with students, journalists, entrepreneurs, and these sort of much higher stature defense to tech leaders and tech leaders across the country.
Jerry Quijano [00:05:04] Yeah, can you tell us about some of the projects that he was working on?
Brent Weistrom [00:05:07] Yes, the most recent thing, you know, people might recognize now Austin has this huge defense tech ecosystem and he was a huge part of that. If you wind the clock back, like, I think seven or eight years, he was starting to have those initial meetings with members of the defense community that helped lead to Army Futures Command being planted in Austin. And many of the branches of the military had their innovation offices set up inside of Capital Factory and they’re building downtown in the Omni Center. So he was just very instrumental in that. And that seems to be the biggest impact that we see right now here today. But if you wind the clock back further, the early investments he made in a lot of startups that might not have otherwise gotten invested in and have grown up, have created thousands of jobs, hundreds of companies, and given people sort of a leg up in the startup world.
Jerry Quijano [00:05:54] Are some of those names that we might recognize some of these companies?
Brent Weistrom [00:05:57] Yeah, I think one that’s really prominent right now is Aptronic, they make humanoid robots and Capital Factory made the biggest investment they’ve ever made into that company. And I think Josh met the folks at Aptronics when he was at the University of Texas where Aptronik was spun out of. So, he’s sort of in every corner of the tech and startup world here in Austin and across the state and country really.
Jerry Quijano [00:06:18] You said you told me earlier that you got a chance to know him professionally as well as outside of that professional scene. What kind of person was he?
Brent Weistrom [00:06:26] Yeah, he was just, I mean, unabashedly passionate about tech. So like when I look back at some of the text messages I’ve gotten from him in the past month or so, he’s talking about vibe coding a lot. He’s like, check out this app I just built, it’s so cool. And I joke with my wife like, hey, this guy is like, you know, pretty high flyer and he sounds like a college student discovering clod and learning how to vibe code. He was extremely easy to know, very personable. He had his quirks about him, like the shoes. He would always wear shoes that were related to either somebody he was meeting or a new technology. So I’d always be looking to his feet to kind of get a hint at what might be coming or what’s on his mind. He always had his little puppy with him pretty much everywhere he went and just constantly munching on candy. Like mid-interview, he would take a bite of a Snickers or something and that always stuck out to me as like he’s just got, you know, this sort of high schooler personality with like a genius brain at the same time. So it was kind of cool to see both those aspects of him.
Jerry Quijano [00:07:25] I know it’s really early since the news came out, what has the response been so far?
Brent Weistrom [00:07:30] Just an outpouring, I’ve seen a lot on social media. My phone’s been ringing off the hook. People across the country really that have had touch points in Austin, reaching out and saying like, it’s just such a shock. Obviously nobody saw anything like this coming. So I think the broader community is just kind of in a state of shock about all of a sudden he’s gone and he was sort of the leader of the local community.
Jerry Quijano [00:07:53] Do you think somebody will stand up in that spot or do you think he kind of was a one of one and the startup scene here will just kind of have to adapt now that he is gone.
Brent Weistrom [00:08:03] Yeah, unfortunately, I think it’s kind of the latter. I think he was sort of a one of one in respect to how much tenacity and how much effort he put into pumping up the local ecosystem and really giving us a name around the country. There’s plenty of talented people at Capital Factory, so I’m sure they’ll continue on and continue to be a powerhouse. But as a singular person, I don’t think his shoes will be filled anytime soon.
Jerry Quijano [00:08:28] Okay, we have been speaking with Brent Wiestrom. He is Assistant Managing Editor at the Austin Business Journal. Brent, thank you for your time. My pleasure, thank-you. Summer break is underway for the Austin Independent School District, and teachers and staff from ten campuses that are closing or getting ready to go to new schools in the fall. But one teacher at Martin Middle School is taking a different path. KUT’s Greta Diaz Gonzalez-Vasquez has the story.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:08:58] All right, let’s get started. So as I promised you yesterday, we were going to do something different today. We’ve been working.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:09:07] Michele Scroggs has been…
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:09:08] Teaching for as long as she can remember. I’ve always been a teacher when I was eight years old I was making lesson plans and making my friends do it.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:09:16] By the early 90s, she became an educator in Ohio, and ever since she moved to Austin in 2014, she has been working at St. Martin Middle School teaching math. Her students have always been at the center of everything she does.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:09:29] I love teaching. I absolutely adore teaching. I adore my kids. I adore the ones that give me hugs. I adore that knuckleheads that wanna say some inappropriate things to me. By the end of the school year, they used to end up being my friends.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:09:44] As the school year came to a close, Scruggs tried to have fun lessons for her students.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:09:50] All right, so what we’re going to do is we’re going to play a game.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:09:55] On a Thursday in late May, 8th graders are learning about vectors through a racing game. They move imaginary cars across a piece of paper while writing down coordinates.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:10:05] So what is a vector? This is new language for you. What is a Vector?
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:10:10] Scroggs walks around her classroom explaining the lesson to those who don’t get it. Here is zero-zero.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:10:17] Are you going to go down or are you going go down?
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:10:20] Room 208 is the only classroom at Martin that has a blue sky and clouds painted on the ceiling. The walls are decorated with students’ art and colorful paper airplanes. Scrugg says it’s important to make her students feel like this is their space.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:10:35] There’s a special type of student here at Martin Middle School. Not everybody can relate to them.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:10:40] But Scroggs can, they remind her of herself growing up. More than 80% of Martin’s students are African American or Hispanic. 95% come from economically disadvantaged families. One in every three need special education, almost double the state’s average. Eighth grader Vincent Moreno says some adults underestimate them, but not Ms. Scrog.
Vincent Moreno [00:11:01] She just feels like herself. She feels more genuine than most teachers, because she’ll joke with us. We have inside jokes. It just feels real, you know, whenever we’re in this room.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:11:12] The student says Krox stays after school to explain things they don’t understand. She also lets them make up tests they have missed. Moreno says she pushes them to be better.
Vincent Moreno [00:11:21] There will be teachers who will give us enough work so that it’s really easy to get done, right? But like, Ms. Gruggs, it’s never easy to all of our work done. It’s always a challenge.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:11:33] It’s always a challenge they can overcome. It’s not always about the grade, it’s just getting them to recognize that you have the ability to succeed in life wherever you want to go. It’s about your choices and not what society chooses for you. So that’s my goal in math.
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:11:52] In middle school has received three consecutive federal grades from the state. Students say sometimes it feels like adults don’t believe in them. Seventh grader Motaz Al-Shiblawi says Ms. Cruggs does.
Motaz Al-Shiblawi [00:12:05] Instead of a student and always gives us a better understanding of her teaching and she always is playful, kind, funny, helpful and a great teacher in general. Scrag says her goal is for students to know
Greta Diaz Gonzalez Vasquez [00:12:18] they are capable. I would love it if they were all perfect A students but more importantly I need them to know that they are valued human beings and they can go anywhere in life. And yes, being in the classroom is not always easy, especially when, as Greg says, in some classes, 50% of our students need a special education or bilingual specialist. Most of the time it was just me and those kids, and we did the best that we could. On the day after school ended, teachers and staff at Martin are packing their belongings. They won’t be coming back to this campus in the fall. As everyone wishes each other a great summer, Scruggs says it’s hard to say goodbye to people she has worked with for over a decade. We bond together to take care of the kids, and not only take care the kids take care of each other, and so we form a family. Yeah, we look out for each other. Crocs walks with a cart up to her classroom, but she keeps getting stopped by her colleagues. I should be going in that direction pretty soon, you know. I promise you that if Martin wasn’t closing, I wouldn’t be retiring. I hear you. Yeah, but enjoy. Thank you. Take care. During the last 12 years, Scrogg says Maureen has had at least six different principals and assistant principals. She says every one of them came with their own ideas. And they want to shoehorn the teachers into that idea without taking the time to get to know the teachers, their styles, and everything. And that’s time consuming. And it’s frustrating for them. So while most of her colleagues are going to other schools, Scruggs decided to retire from teaching. I just don’t feel like going through that again. She plans to pivot and work for her family business. As Scrugg packs her things and takes posters off the wall, colleagues come to say goodbye and bring her flowers. I’m sure I’ll be asking you teaching questions. Thank you. Absolutely. Okay. Where’s my phone? They’re all sad that Martin is closing. Some more than others. It’s okay. It’s ok. I get it. I Get it. But they all find comfort in scrugs. Everything’s gonna be fine. I hope so. You’re gonna be fine, you’re gonna do amazing over at Travis. Just like with her students, she tells colleagues they can do whatever they set their mind to. You’re gonna be okay. You got my number. I know. It’s hard. I just walked around taking pictures of the whole school. Okay. Yeah. They talk about the hard times, but it’s the good times that they’re taking with them. It was fun though. Yeah, it was. After everyone leaves, room 208 feels empty. The walls are now back to their beige color. Skrug says the room no longer feels like it’s hers. It hurts. It hurts, yep. Not ready for it to happen, but it is as they say, it is. Scrock says she’ll try to look out for her colleagues, but as much as she has made up her mind, it’s not easy to think she won’t be close to her students anymore. I’m Greta Diaz-Gonzalez Vazquez in Austin.
Jerry Quijano [00:15:45] We have more Austin Signal coming up for you after this break. Thank you for making us part of your day. This is Austin Signal, welcome back. A Travis County District judge has ruled Austin’s plan to fund the expansion of the Austin Convention Center is lawful. Earlier this week, a judge oversaw a hearing between the city, state, and opponents over the validity of bonds to fund this project. The Austin City Council approved last month issuing up to $1.35 billion in bonds to move the project forward. The city would use hotel occupancy tax funds to help pay down the debt. The ruling means the project can move forward as planned. Completion is set for 2029. An extreme heat warning remains in effect today in the area through 8 p.m. The National Weather Service warns that heat indices in the region could range from 108 to 118 degrees. Stay cool out there and make other plans if you were planned to be out in the sun and if those plans involve a swim, be advised Barton Springs Pool remains closed due to flooding brought on by heavy rains earlier this week. The Black Auteur Film Festival is in its third year running, showcasing short films directed by black Texans. It’s happening this Saturday out at Austin Film Society, and joining us now are co-founders and festival directors Alex Chu and Ryan Darbin. Thank you for being with us.
Alex Chu [00:17:18] Thanks for having us.
Jerry Quijano [00:17:19] Yeah, thank y’all so much. So for a listener out there who might not be familiar with Black Alter Film Festival, where did this idea come from? How did it get started?
Ryan Darbin [00:17:28] A little bit of, I guess, context. Alex and I have both, we’re filmmakers, but in addition to that, we have both kind of programmed throughout our time in Austin. I used to work at Austin Film Festival as a programming director there in 2013. Programmed my own repertory series. Alex programmed her own festival that she started, the Austin Youth Film Festival. And so as a result of that, I got asked by Coletown Theater, which I did a lot of stuff with them over the course of 10 years to help program. They wanted to program a tiny little black film festival because they had a filmmaker coming in from. New York to screen his movies, his name’s Tarek, amazing filmmaker, wrote for the Amber Ruffin Show. So I needed help so I asked Alex and it was going to be a one and done thing and we weren’t going to do it again. And then, yeah, we did it, we had fun and we were like, oh, this is great, we want to do more of this. It was nice getting all these people in a room to sort of champion black films and black filmmakers from Texas and just the vibe and the energy was great. And so we continued.
Alex Chu [00:18:23] Doing it. Yeah, we’re the only black film festival in Austin, and as black filmmakers, we really noticed that vacuum, and we just wanted to fill that hole in the community and create a space for us to come together and really support black directors. And all of our black auteurs that you’ll see on Saturday, June 20th at AFS Cinema are Texas-based.
Jerry Quijano [00:18:47] Okay, cool. We’re going to talk about that film festival. I wanted to talk about other ways that you shine a light on black film here in Austin. I know this is the third year of the festival but in what other ways do you shine a light on these directors?
Alex Chu [00:18:58] Right, well, our mission is to celebrate, elevate, and preserve black cinema. So we have programming all year round. We show repertory screenings. We just did a 35-millimeter screening of Creed at the Paramount Theater.
Ryan Darbin [00:19:12] Oh, very cool.
Alex Chu [00:19:13] Which was really fun. We did Coming to America before that.
Ryan Darbin [00:19:16] And then we’ve had local showcases with filmmakers here in Austin, too. We did a thing at We Love Video called We Real Cool, which was a shorts block of Austin filmmakers as well. And just kind of, again, we’re not just the festival, right? It’s a sort of this year-round programming of not only repertory filmmaking, but also just trying to highlight these local filmmakers aswell.
Alex Chu [00:19:34] Right, so with Coming to America, we had a film from Prince Adabla, who we love, who screened his film, Mamaya, with us. And it had a connection to Coming to American. So we played that. He got to show his film at the Paramount to this big audience that’s there for Coming to America. But they also got to be introduced to his work. And we have a lot more screenings like that planned for the fall and for next spring as well.
Jerry Quijano [00:20:00] Okay, well, tell us about what’s happening this Saturday. Who’s gonna be showcased, and what are some of the films that you’re really excited about?
Ryan Darbin [00:20:06] Yeah, so I mean, it’s our festival this year is gonna be a little bit bigger. We’ve got our shorts block. We got our audience award. We have our audience raffle prizes and we also have a special guest coming in from LA. This director named Jason Perez, who did this Peacock series about black cowboys.
Alex Chu [00:20:21] Yeah, High Horse, The Black Cowboy. It’s a three-part docu-series about black cowboy culture. And someone featured in the documentary lives in South Austin. They run the Alexander farm, and they’ve experienced eminent domain takeovers of their land. So the film explores that. And they’ll be with us as well. And we’re going to have a conversation about black cowboys. And it’s, you know, it’s about a South Austin farm. And so we’ll be there with Jason Perez. And then we have these wonderful shorts, all different genres. I’m really excited. One of my favorites, they’re all my favorite first on the record. They’re all, my equal favorite, but also another one of my favorite is Esther. Esther was directed by Joey Hunt, who is local.
Ryan Darbin [00:21:09] He’s a local, not only local filmmaker, but a really amazing DP here in Austin.
Alex Chu [00:21:13] Yeah, amazing director of photography and it’s a very like black and white shot on film, old Hollywood studio kind of film, which I love because I grew up on Turner Classic movies and the classics. So if you like that, you’re going to get it with Esther.
Ryan Darbin [00:21:29] And then we have another local Austin-based filmmaker, Prince Adabla again with his short Fugu. Prince is from Ghana and he now lives here in Austin. He’s an Austin filmmaker, but a lot of his stuff is centered around the immigrant experience, right? The black immigrant experience. And so really excited for that one as well.
Jerry Quijano [00:21:46] Okay well as filmmakers, creators, yourselves, what is it like to see these other folks that you’re shining a light on? What does that bring to you as a filmmaker? Like how does that kind of fuel the work that you’re doing seeing younger generations or just different people getting their work to be seen? Jealous.
Ryan Darbin [00:22:06] I’m jealous, on the record, quote me. No, I think it’s rad. I mean, like Alex had said earlier, BAF is not an avenue for us to promote ourselves, right? And so the whole thing is kind of a selfless, us giving back to the filmmakers that we admire because we’re inspired by them as well. And so I think, it’s really nice. Filmmaking is very hard, anyone that’s done it on any level, it is very to get anything made. And so, you know, the point of making things, you’re not hoarding it, you wanna share it with an audience. So it’s very nice to, not only, shared with an audience, but seen on a big screen at AFS cinema and shared with the kind of audience. Bath is for everybody, right? But I think there’s certain things, certain nuances about the Black experience that I think growing up Black you’re going to get. And it’s really nice to share those kinds of films with an audience like that who would get it, right. You don’t have to, you can kind of circumvent the hand-holding process or explaining certain jokes or certain things or certain experiences.
Alex Chu [00:22:58] And we’re vocal. So it’s an experience being in the theater. You’re gonna hear people not afraid to laugh out loud and really experience and go on the ride of the film. So it just feels like this community, this communal cinematic experience, the way that cinema was always supposed to be.
Jerry Quijano [00:23:17] Fantastic all right we have been speaking with Alex Chu and Ryan Darbin co-founders and festival directors of the black auteur film festival We’re gonna have a link to more about the fest in today’s show notes. Thank y’all for being with us
Alex Chu [00:23:29] Thank you for having us.
Jerry Quijano [00:23:30] Yeah, thank y’all so much. And thank you for tuning out, tuning in out there. There’s more from us at… Jerry. Jerry, I’m sorry. I need to interrupt.
Jimmy Maas [00:23:40] Jimmy? Jimmy Moss, KET program director here, and I’ve got something special for you, Jerry.
Jerry Quijano [00:23:48] I hope so. You’re interrupting my show.
Jimmy Maas [00:23:50] I know, I know. It’s weird and unconventional, but this is an unconventional day. As you may know, dear listener, the Austin Chronicle Best of Austin Awards are out today and we have some great news. You, Jerry Quijano, are once again winner of… Of best radio or podcast host in the reader poll and the best of Austin Awards. Congratulations. This is your second win, a one-year absence from the award, but that’s fine. Whoever won last year, it’s no big deal.
Jerry Quijano [00:24:29] I’m pretty sure it was Laurie. Yeah, we have. It was Laurie, yeah.
Jimmy Maas [00:24:31] We stop mentioning KTX yeah they are
Jerry Quijano [00:24:34] Sorry, sorry.
Jimmy Maas [00:24:36] KUT won other awards as well, best talk show for, not this show, but Texas Standard. We were a close runner up. You got the best host. I mean, come on, what are you going to do? And we also won best reporter most, Bouchelle. And I’m jealous. We just talked a little bit about jealousy in the last interview. KUTx won best radio station and is program director of KUT. It hurts a little bit, but, you know, as friends of everybody over at KUTX, but I do have something special for you. I gathered a series of fake awards from around since in lieu of a physical thing to give you. Here is a trophy for Junior softball most prolific. Yeah, there you go. And here’s a copy. You’ll have to give this back, but this is a placard. Of a best of Austin award from 2023. And so it’ll be like when you get so eventually.
Jerry Quijano [00:25:38] I appreciate it. You know, I’d like to keep the spirit of John Ailey going forward And I really feel like he would have been proud of that segment that we just pulled off right there. So congratulations
Jimmy Maas [00:25:46] Congratulations. I feel like it was just yesterday. I plucked you from obscurity and now here you are. Oh wait, I didn’t do that
Jerry Quijano [00:25:53] And here we are now, and thank you for being with us. Austin Signal will be back at the same time tomorrow.
This transcript was transcribed by AI, and lightly edited by a human. Accuracy may vary. This text may be revised in the future.
