Billy ORGEL

Tower Ventures
CEO

Entrepreneur

William E. Orgel (Billy) is a native of Memphis, Tennessee and a BBA from the University of Texas at Austin in 1985. After graduation, he moved to Memphis to work at his family business, Majestic Communications, which he helped build into the areas’ largest retailer of Motorola two-way radio equipment as well as the largest private licensee of 800MHZ FCC licenses. Due to the Telecommunications Act of 1996 there began an emergence of multiple wireless phone carriers across the country, and Billy began to build on his existing portfolio of communications towers by performing build to suit services for these new carriers. His company that he runs with his partners, Tower Ventures, currently own over 600 towers and they have built and sold 400 towers since the company began. Currently, Tower Ventures leases tower space in over 30 states and is one of the largest private tower companies in the country. Tower Ventures has also established a REIT, Tower Ventures REIT, to purchase easements and land underneath existing tower sites across the country.

Billy is the Immediate Past President of the Board of Trustees at Temple Israel Synagogue and former Co-Chair of their $25 million capital campaign. Recently, he was elected to the Unified Shelby County School Board and was selected as Chairman of this body for the past two years. He is a Past Chairman of the Board of Directors of Bridges, Inc., where he chaired the Building Committee for their new facility.

Billy is also a past Board Member of the New Memphis Arena Public Building Authority that oversaw the construction of the FedEx Forum, the home of the University of Memphis Tigers and the NBA’s Memphis Grizzlies. This past year he also became one of the members of the Grizzlies ownership group. In addition, he is a member of the Executive Board of the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, a member of the Le Bonheur Foundation Board and a past member of both the Port Commission for Memphis and Shelby County and the Memphis and Shelby County Charter Commission. Billy and his wife, Robin, are also Ambassadors for the University of Memphis Athletic Department In 1999, Billy was selected by the Memphis Business Journal as one of their “Top 40 Under 40” of local community leaders and was recently selected as a member of the Memphis chapter of the Society of Entrepreneurs, where he now serves on the board.

In addition, Billy is an Organizer and Director of the First Capital Bank located in Germantown, Tennessee, a community bank with 185 million in assets. Over the years, Billy became interested in preserving historic buildings in Downtown Memphis, and to date he and his partners have completed new construction as well as the preservation of 6 buildings that include commercial space and 215 apartments. Billy is also involved in the restaurant business as a franchisee of Ruth’s Chris in Rogers, Arkansas.

He and his wife, Robin Salky Orgel, are life long Memphians and have three children, Benjamin (21), Megan (18), and Hannah (14). Benjamin is a senior at The University of Texas at Austin and Megan is an incoming freshman. Hannah recently graduated from White Station Middle School and will be attending St Mary’s this year.