News Release February 24, 2016
Media Contact: Geoff Wasserman
864-281-1323 ext #1001
Geoff@createlaunchlead.com
Greenville, S.C. – Kopis CEO Andrew Kurtz was honored Tuesday by the Greenville Chamber of Commerce, as a recipient of the organization’s prestigious Buck Mickel Leadership Award, honoring those who have had a dramatic impact on their community by playing a leadership role in solving critical community issues, strengthening the community or providing visionary leadership to a major community development project.
The award was given to Kurtz and seven other NEXT entrepreneurs for their efforts in helping to launch NEXTsc.org and make it what it is today. Along with Kurtz, the other seven entrepreneurs honored included:
• Peter Barth, The Iron Yard
• Michael Bolick, Selah Genomics
• Ken Brower, NWN Corporation
• Matt Gevaert, Kiyatec
• Scott Millwood, Hitachi Solutions (formerly Customer Effective)
• Jeff Papenfus (posthumously), Northgate Labs
• Peter Waldschmidt, Gnoso
“This is an honor to be recognized among this great group of leaders,” said Kurtz, “Our company (Kopis) was created to solve complex problems for clients. When the opportunity arose to join a small group of entrepreneurs to launch NEXT as a way to solve community and entrepreneurial issues our state’s economy was facing in 2005, we had to get involved. It’s been a joy to see the impact NEXT has had over the past decade.”
About NEXT: Born out a discussion among local entrepreneurs searching for new strategies for improving the state’s economy and after hearing an inspiring update about the Charleston Digital Corridor, entrepreneur Jeff Papenfus scrawled on a paper napkin, “Why aren’t we doing this in Greenville?” It was at that seminal moment that the group and community leaders began to coalesce into an effort that would soon become NEXT, whose original vision and goals included providing the support entrepreneurs require to build strong, successful, globally-competitive businesses.
About Kopis: Founded in 1999, Kopis (formerly ProActive Technology) began as a technology consulting and custom software development firm and today, Kopis is the oldest custom software development and consulting firm in the region and an anchor in the technology community. Kopis provides services for a wide variety of clients, ranging from Fortune 100 companies to successful start-ups. Kopis services include: application development, business intelligence, mobile app development, SQL managed services, strategic corporate consulting, and database administration services.
