Avram Ninyo, founder of Ninyo & Moore, is the SBA’s 2005 Small Business Person of the Year.

Like many college students before him, Avram Ninyo’s life was dramatically altered by a teacher. While studying civil engineering at the American Robert College in Istanbul, the Turkish-born Ninyo fell in love with the field of geotechnology. “I took a class from Karl von Terzaghi, who is known as the father of soil mechanics,” Ninyo says. “Studying with him, I became more and more involved in geotechnical engineering. I’ve always loved seeing a construction project being created and having a lasting effect on the landscape. Geotechnology is the beginning of every construction project because it makes sure the soil is stable. It’s a challenge to build properly so that it won’t fail in heavy rains or earthquakes.”

Ninyo combined that passion for construction and geotechnology to create Ninyo & Moore, a San Diego-based environmental sciences engineering and consulting firm that has provided geotechnical evaluations for municipal, federal, military and private sector projects since 1986. The business has regional offices in Irvine, Los Angeles, Oakland, San Francisco, Ontario, Las Vegas, Carson City, Phoenix and Salt Lake City. The firm’s 300 employees include geo-technical and civil engineers, geologists, hydrogeologists, engineering geologists, and environmental scientists who specialize in regulatory issues and interpretation, hazardous waste management, remedial action planning and asbestos and lead-based paint assessment and monitoring.

“Ninyo & Moore is an excellent success story of a company that has advanced and created new jobs with the assistance of SBA, our resource partner, the CDC Small Business Finance and our lending partner, Wells Fargo Bank,” says George Chandler, district director of the San Diego office of the U.S. Small Business Administration. “We are delighted that a firm that has received our help is being recognized for its accomplishments.”

Other SBA award winners are:

Betty Hall

Lois Sudmeier

Carmen Amigon

Paul Hollenbach

• 2005 Woman-Owned Small Business of the Year — Betty Hall, Canyon Creek Animal Hospital.
  
  
• 2005 Family-Owned Small Business of the Year — David & Ruby Konstantin, K-CO Construction Inc.
  
  
• 2005 Minority-Owned Small Business of the Year — Harold & Tina Lewis, JRL, LLC.
  
  
• 2005 Veteran Small Business Champion of the Year — Robert Mulz, Disabled Veteran Business Enterprise Network.
  
  
• 2005 Delores Braswell Award: Advocating Women in Business — Lois Sudmeier, SCORE Counselors to America’s Small Business.
  
  
• 2005 Minority Small Business Champion of the Year — Carmen Amigon, Community Housing Works.
  
  
• 2005 Home-Based Business Champion of the Year — Paul Hollenbach, Hollenbach & Associates/SCORE.
  
  
• 2005 Financial Services Champion of the Year — William Martinez, Winston Real Estate/Southwestern College SBDITC.
  
  
• 2005 Small Business Lender of the Year — Kurt Chilcott, CDC Small Business Finance Corp.
  
  
• 2005 Small Business Lender of the Year — Rick Benito, Bank of America.

For Ninyo, this award represents the culmination of a successful career. Although the business struggled during the construction downturn of the early ’90s, the need for its services has significantly increased with the ecological and financial concerns of the last decade. “Builders are recognizing the need for proper engineering,” he explains. “As land has become more expensive, people are building high-rises on land that didn’t pencil out before. So the need for our services continues to increase.”

Ninyo hasn’t forgotten his college days, which is why Ninyo & Moore has endowed awards at UCSD and SDSU to encourage minority and female students to pursue careers in geotechnical engineering and engineering geology. The firm is also a founding partner of the San Diego Chapter Society of Women Engineers Civil Engineering Scholarship. Other events and charities supported by the company include March of Dimes, United Cerebral Palsy, Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation, and Boys and Girls Clubs, among many others.

Ninyo, who has been married for 30 years to his wife Susan, a part-timer in the firm’s accounting department, has a daughter studying geology at UC Santa Cruz and a son studying field engineering at UC Santa Barbara. In his spare time, the Rancho Santa Fe resident plays tennis and bridge. “Bridge is an addiction I have,” he says with a chuckle.

But most of the time, he is busy at the office. “We only see constant growth in the company’s future,” he says. “We will grow in different fields and areas. It’s a wonderful field. It’s one profession that can’t be replaced by a computer.”