The Honorable Brandon L. Simmons (Houston, Texas)

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Simmons is a technology entrepreneur, board member, and education innovator. He is a recognized expert in governance and leadership, having advised board members and management extensively and having served on governing boards across education, philanthropy, and business. Simmons has served on corporate boards and in executive leadership for early and growth-stage companies in the energy and technology sectors. He has experience in venture capital in leadership and as an investor and advisor to emerging managers. Simmons is also an experienced attorney, having served as general counsel to a global energy tech company and in the corporate practice of Hogan Lovells, counseling technology companies and investors on transactions and corporate governance.   

Simmons is an advocate for the transformational power of capitalism and proponent of policies and programs that leverage the economy to unlock opportunity and success for individuals and families. He launched and personally hosts a national mentoring series that connects young people with inspiring business role models to raise awareness of private sector career paths, especially in the technology sector, and he established an endowment at TSU to support student internships in STEM. 

Together with Regent Ben Proler, Simmons launched an interfaith partnership with the Israeli Consulate to the Southwest United States and the Jewish Federation of Houston. This effort builds on a generational relationship between Texas Southern University and the Jewish community of Texas, one that dates back to the university’s founding in 1927. The Houston Chronicle published Simmons’ Op-Ed on this effort in September of 2025.

Inspired by his experience at TSU, Simmons has deepened his commitment to higher education. In the Fall of 2024, he was appointed Entrepreneur in Residence at Wiley University in Marshall, Texas. In 2025, he was appointed Distinguished Professor of Business at Wiley University, focusing on business, entrepreneurship, and workforce development. Simmons delivered the Convocation Address at The Imani School in 2024 and the Honors Convocation Address at Wiley University in 2025. In recognition of his educational leadership, Simmons was honored as a “Legendary Scholar” at the Community of Faith Houston’s 2024 Black History Month Celebration.

Simmons earned a Bachelor of Arts from the University of California, Berkeley and a Doctor of Jurisprudence from Stanford Law School. Following college, he was awarded the John W. Gardner Fellowship, a joint honor of Stanford University and the University of California. Following law school, he served as a law clerk for Chief Judge J.L. Edmondson of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Simmons has been a member of the Young Presidents’ Organization.   

Simmons is a fifth-generation Texan and third-generation Houstonian. His father was raised in Houston’s Fifth Ward, where his grandfather was a Deacon at Olivet Missionary Baptist Church. Through Simmons’ decades-long economic empowerment efforts, he honors the Simmons family’s generational journey: labor in east Texas fields and pine forests in the 19th century, westward migration from Houston to San Francisco via military service and classroom teaching in the 20th century, and return from Silicon Valley to Texas soil in the 21st century via entrepreneurship.