Photography by: Mark Susko Visual Design.

Stephen Baxley was known as "the pager guy" in high school. In the late 1990s when pagers were popular among his classmates, Baxley saw an opportunity to sell and activate pagers for students and cell phones for their parents. What he didn't know at the time was how far wireless technology would take him.

After high school, Baxley bounced around to different opportunities, eventually landing back in the wireless field. At 20, he was working in sales at BellSouth, where he started a repairing program to supplement the company's sales department. By 21, he was managing more than fifty service centers in four states for Nextel in their repair division.

Baxley got twelve years of experience there before he got the opportunity to help build the CPR Cell Phone Repair franchise in South Carolina with the area developer. After helping to build the franchise, Stephen bought the local business in 2016.

"We were the first," Baxley says of his cell phone repair business. "No one else really focused on this in 2012. We're the oldest in the Upstate – really in the state. Our brand is the largest. We have locations everywhere."

Stephen owns seven of more than twenty-five CPR stores in South Carolina – five of which are in the Upstate. But CPR does a lot more than just repair cell phones. While the storefronts focus on the customers, much of the business is designed to focus on enterprise business support and education. CPR provides technology support to schools, hospitals, and other businesses in the Upstate.

"We manage more than 20,000 devices for schools. We repair up to 50 devices and return them the same day," says Baxley. "We keep the devices working so schools can keep the students learning."

Just as his success with CPR was borne from his pager "business" in high school, Stephen has developed another business venture from his technology repair experience. With pagers obsolete and cell phones booming, he decided to get involved on the cutting edge of technology—drones.

Airworx Unmanned Solutions is a spinoff of CPR that sells and services UAVs or "drones," but that includes much more than the average consumer might think. Airworx provides solutions packages to enterprise customers and public entities that need aerial imaging for real estate, construction, agriculture, and public safety. They even help with search and rescue missions and educate local businesses in how to fly drones for their own purposes.

"We have a lot of federal regulations that we have to abide by," says Stephen. "There are a lot of people doing this illegally, and we try to educate people that they could be civilly liable for doing it without a license and insurance."

All Airworx employees are certified by the FAA to fly these drones and several have experience as pilots—domestic and military. The company is bonded for $2 million and is 100% legal. A great deal of their focus is helping businesses stay within FAA regulations while flying drones. The agriculture services market is one Airworx is just breaking into.

"We are working with an aerospace satellite company that can use artificial intelligence algorithms along with our images to tell us large-scale plant health, estimate crop yields, and determine moisture and drainage issues. This increases awareness of the current state of the cop much more quickly."

Stephen Baxley has made quite a leap since his days as "the pager guy." Whether it's a simple cell phone repair or an unmanned flying innovation, CPR and Airworx want to save your mobile life.

Photography by: Mark Susko Visual Design.

838 Powdersville Rd., Suite P, Easley | 864.970.4668
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