"technology" Tagged Stories

Study shows when it comes to firefighters, the more the better

Greenville chief calls department’s staffing adequate, says new station is needed

JUNE 4, 2010 11:59 a.m. Comments (0)

When an emergency call comes in to the Greenville Fire Department on the fast-growing far eastside of Greenville near Woodruff Road, there’s a greater chance than anywhere else in the city the station assigned to cover the area won’t be available to answer the call.

And if the Pleasantburg station isn’t on another call, there’s a greater chance than anywhere else in the city it will take more than four minutes for firefighters to arrive on the scene. Continue reading...

Arts and the app

Metropolitan Arts Council offers mobile help for Open Studios

NOVEMBER 5, 2010 11:46 a.m. Comments (0)

With a record number of artists participating in this weekend’s Greenville Open Studios and two days in which to visit them, planning will be key for Piedmont’s Stacy Miller.

And there’s an app to help her do that.

Miller, an art lover who has lived in the Upstate just a few weeks, plans to visit as many as a dozen of the 142 participating artists on Saturday and another half dozen on Sunday, and she’ll use a new app to help her decide which artists she wants to see and the route she’ll use to get there. Continue reading...

Tech-for-all

Group aims to keep Upstate a step ahead

NOVEMBER 30, 2010 2:41 p.m. Comments (0)

Four years ago, exactly one week before the first person posted on Twitter, Trey Pennington called Phil Yanov to speak at a Greenville County School District and Rotary Club event.

“I wanted someone who could encourage students to prepare for the coming age of social media,” says Pennington, a marketer and social technology speaker, “and Phil is the go-to man for all things technology.”

Yanov has been organizing technology networking groups in Greenville since 1983. Continue reading...

Lab Work

CU-ICAR helps Upstate company pull off project, before deadline

FEBRUARY 10, 2011 1:46 p.m. Comments (0)

When Sealevel Systems needed to run critical tests on a computer docking station for the military, the company turned to a lab at Clemson University’s International Center for Automotive Research.

The Liberty company was in a bind. It had to pass inspection by Jan. 20 to meet a production schedule, but the Upstate’s worst snow and ice storm in years was in the way. CU-ICAR was closed.

“They opened for us and said come and go as you please,” said Ben O’Hanlan, chief operating officer. “Not only did ICAR come to our rescue, they came to our rescue when nobody was getting out of the house.” Continue reading...

Downtown company is bringing back the pager

Zipit Wireless hopes to bring new life to old tech

MARCH 24, 2011 11:40 a.m. Comments (0)

Zipit Wireless, a small Greenville company, and Verizon, the nation’s largest wireless provider, are teaming up to bring new life to pagers with the first significant advancement in that messaging or “beeper” system in 40 years.

The two companies see a ripe market, particularly in hospitals, where an advanced system of paging makes more sense for communication than the cell phones that turned the once ubiquitous pager into a dinosaur.

“We have high expectations,” said Frank Greer, 48, who founded Zipit with Ralph Heredia, 46. “If we did it on our own, it would be a completely different ball game.” Continue reading...

BMW studies use of landfill gas

Technology converts methane to hydrogen to power vehicles

JULY 28, 2011 11:09 a.m. Comments (0)

BMW and the South Carolina Research Authority have begun the first phase of determining the technical and economic feasibility of converting methane gas from a landfill into hydrogen fuel to power the automaker’s entire fleet of material-handling vehicles at its Spartanburg plant.

“This landfill gas-to-hydrogen project at BMW will seek to demonstrate a first-of-its-kind solution that will serve as model for other private sector companies,” said Bill Mahoney, chief executive officer of SCRA, which is funding the first stage at an estimated cost of $1 million.

In later stages, the company and collaborative private and public partners will assist in creating the infrastructure necessary to store the hydrogen, create fuel stations and equip vehicles with systems to use it. Continue reading...

Greenville aims to become a technology hub

NEXT will incubate 12 young tech companies with big ideas ready to market

MAY 11, 2012 9:02 a.m. Comments (11)

Coming to Greenville for the summer: 12 software teams with bright ideas for the Next Big Thing, mentors from big-name companies to coach them and venture capitalists with dollars to get the best of them to consumers.

There’s more at play than taking high-tech startups to market. The Next Big Thing at the NEXT Center gives Greenville a chance to become the Southeast hub for smart technology, a sort of a Rocky Mountain Boulder, Colo., in the Blue Ridge foothills. Continue reading...