Lately we’ve seen some traditional Dallas companies investing in technology and expanding in non-traditional ways. By finding innovative uses of mobile applications and cloud-based services, these firms aren’t just digitizing what they do, but creating opportunities for their own companies and their customers. When the convergence of communications services and devices took hold, consumers and businesses began to behave differently and the culture changed. Businesses are now starting to respond. “There’s a growing realization that companies must establish successful platforms, not just products,” explains Amit Basu, a professor at Southern Methodist University’s Cox School of Business. What’s a platform? Basu… Full Story
Management, Ed Whitacre says, is 95 percent about people. “If you can get that part right—the people part—most times the other stuff will work itself out,” says the plain-spoken Texan. He ought to know. For nearly two decades, the Ennis native successfully ran two of the country’s biggest companies: SBC Communications, now Dallas-based AT&T Corp., and General Motors. When Whitacre was lured out of retirement by the Obama administration in 2009 to take over as GM’s chairman following a bankruptcy filing and $50 billion federal bailout, he didn’t know a thing about the auto business. But he knew plenty about… Full Story
Animation studio Reel FX turns 20 this year. But in many ways, the under-the-radar creative shop run by Steve O’Brien in Deep Ellum still feels and acts like a startup. Maybe it’s the “margatini” drink recipe scribbled in the lower left-hand corner of the white board. It’s right there alongside copious notes about modeling, texture handoffs, quality control, and other things decipherable only to those in the animation industry. The studio, tucked into a sizable but nondescript red-brick building that formerly housed Yahoo Broadcast.com, is buzzing these days with work on two full-length feature films—the company’s first movies developed entirely… Full Story
Nothing says the beginning of summer like a good road trip. We packed our bags, hit the blacktop, and found our 18 favorite getaways, from the great outdoors to posh resorts, and all within a comfortable drive. So, go on. Get your motor running and head out on the highway. Click here to read about our weekend travels featured in the May issue of D Magazine.
Best Doctors in Collin County is a peer-review voting process. We rely on the doctors’ expertise to determine who deserves to be on the list, just like a doctor would recommend a patient to a specialist. This year, we mailed a letter to 1,565 local doctors from our online directory inviting them to vote using a ballot on our website. They could vote for up to three doctors in 38 categories. The nomination form asked them to vote bearing in mind the following question: which Dallas doctors would you trust with the care of a loved one? This year, 295… Full Story
At first glance, Michelle Pelzel doesn’t appear to be someone who has struggled with fertility issues. With her newborn twin boys and toddler daughter in tow, she’s fully immersed in the joys of motherhood. The Plano mom’s situation has changed dramatically from three years ago, when her biological clock was loudly ticking. After trying to become pregnant for a year, Pelzel, then 26, and her husband, Terry, decided it was time to see a fertility specialist. “We didn’t tell people we were trying, but we ended up having dinner with some friends and they were pregnant at the time,” Pelzel… Full Story
You don’t have to remind Beth Van Duyne that the HP Byron Nelson Championship, the world’s most successful professional charity golf event, is preparing to undergo some big changes over the next few years. In fact, it might be better if you didn’t. The Irving mayor knows full well that these changes will include a new title sponsor and, most likely, a new site for the PGA tournament at the future Trinity Forest Golf Course—a 400-acre former landfill about 10 minutes south of downtown Dallas, east of Interstate 45 along Loop 12. The Trinity Forest project, Van Duyne has learned,… Full Story
Last summer my father died in a nursing home adjacent to Central Expressway, the road that, some 57 years ago, he, my mother, my two sisters, and I took to Dallas for the first time, strangers in a strange land. Like thousands of others, we were East Coast expatriates, Jews in a city of gentiles. We were filled with hope and fear. As our leader, my father exuded the most hope and the most fear. He had come here to reinvent himself in a place ripe for reinvention. For the next six decades—from age 38 to his death at 95—my… Full Story
There’s a story about Chris Kyle: on a cold January morning in 2010, he pulled into a gas station somewhere along Highway 67, south of Dallas. He was driving his supercharged black Ford F350 outfitted with black rims and oversize knobby mudding tires. Kyle had replaced the Ford logo on the grill with a small chrome skull, similar to the Punisher emblem from the Marvel Comics series, and added a riot-ready aftermarket grill guard bearing the words ROAD ARMOR. He had just left the Navy and moved back to Texas. Two guys approached him with pistols and demanded his money… Full Story
In mid-January, I received an email from a female reader who occasionally sends me snippets from her dining experiences. She wrote: “The penne with black truffles at Spoon is better than any sex I have ever had.” I read the note out loud to my office mates, and one gal replied, “It’s true. It is better than sex. Take me with you when you review the restaurant.” I took my colleague to Spoon Bar & Kitchen and watched her swoon over soft semolina pasta tubes coated in a buttery black truffle sauce with slightly sharp slivers of Pecorino and generous flecks of… Full Story
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