Wow! What a difference a year makes. Just 12 months ago, we entered 2021 with a collective uncertainty about the days to come and how our region, nation and world would bounce back from a pandemic and the economic shockwaves it produced. Yet a quick review of our area’s headlines this past year tells the story of regained momentum and new successes around innovation and entrepreneurship, in particular.
Here are some of the great things that happened here in 2021.
- Two local technology companies, Immedion and Advoco, were acquired by DartPoints and Accenture, respectively, adding to our region’s growing list of successful entrepreneur exits
- Media platform company 6AM City announced a $5 million capital raise and expansion into 24 new cities across the U.S.
- Cultivation Capital, one of the country’s most active early-stage investment firms opened an office in Greenville, the first outside venture capital office in the Upstate
- VentureSouth announced its expansion into a third state, Virginia, and celebrated the initial public offering of portfolio company Proterra
- Furman University launched the inaugural GVL Starts bootcamp with 22 entrepreneurs participating in the new, eight-week program
- The City of Greenville announced its “From Here, You can Change the World” media campaign targeting innovators and entrepreneurs
- The Upstate Alliance held the first-ever Innovator Homecoming event to attract global innovators to return to the area for their next venture
- Build Carolina graduated its 10th cohort of Carolina Code School students and launched a statewide fellowship program for computer programmers called Develop Carolina
- Hartness Development announced Crescent SC, a new innovation-centric development in partnership with Furman University, FlyWheel, and VentureSouth
- NEXT hired its new Executive Director, Eric Weissmann from Cincinnati, Ohio, where he co-founded Cintrifuse and launched “StartupCincy”
As we close out the last 12 months, let’s pause to celebrate the successes we’ve experienced and thank those who made it all happen. What a great year it was! So here’s to 2021 and our commitment to make 2022 even better. Onward and upward.
– John Moore is a principal with Momenteum Strategies, an Upstate-based consulting firm specializing in helping communities and their economic development organizations build thriving, impactful innovation ecosystems.
