Second Annual Conversation on Entrepreneurship in South Carolina Focuses on Growing High-Impact Firms
April 27, 2009COLUMBIA, SC – April 27, 2009 – New Carolina – South Carolina’s Council on Competitiveness, yesterday hosted its second annual Conversation on entrepreneurship on April 23rd. About 100 leaders from state and regional organizations dedicated to promoting entrepreneurship in South Carolina met at Midlands Technical College Enterprise Campus to discuss approaches for promoting the expansion of homegrown, high-impact firms.
Together with sponsors from the South Carolina Department of Commerce, SCLaunch! SCEDA and MidlandsTechnical College, New Carolina brought EntreWorks CEO Erik Pages to Columbia, and heard from Upstate, South Carolina entrepreneur Bill Masters. Open discussions during the forum focused on how to build stronger statewide partnerships to enhance existing entrepreneurship initiatives.
South Carolina is making smart choices in establishing initiatives and providing the resources needed to create and grow more entrepreneurial firms, Pages said. It is clear from this meeting that South Carolina is now prepared to take this effort to the next level by building a network of organizations that are ready to work together. A key lesson from successful regional entrepreneurship programs in the U.S. and overseas is, “‘collaboration works.’
During the last 10 years, South Carolina has become increasingly successful in generating rapidly expanding, small homegrown firms. High impact firms are creating a large percentage of the state’s new jobs and new wealth; yet, South Carolina still lags behind neighboring states in creating its own companies that eventually produce $200 million or more in annual sales.
“The good news is we are becoming more competitive, by creating more high impact firms in South Carolina, including start ups and small existing companies” said Garry Powers, chair of the New Carolina Entrepreneurship Task Force. “With forums like the Conversation on entrepreneurship, leaders can discuss statewide partnerships and resources for making South Carolina a leader in creating high impact firms.”
“During the last decade, South Carolina has created sophisticated and effective programs to support high impact entrepreneurs,” said George Fletcher, executive director of New Carolina. “This includes technology commercialization programs, investment capital initiatives, and regional initiatives to develop and sustain the pipeline of high impact entrepreneurs.”
New Carolina
New Carolina – also known as SC’s Council on Competitiveness – is a public-private partnership working to increase per capita income in South Carolina. Visit www.newcarolina.org for more.