SAN DIEGO - Manny Prupes, 53, chairman of credit union data processor Symitar Systems, passed away on Feb. 28. The official cause of death was not released, however Symitar officials said Prupes had been battling a chronic illness for the past few years. Prupes was one of three founders of Symitar, which was formed in 1984. He consistently touted customer service and good technology as the reasons for Symitar's success. The company, which has 240 CU clients, celebrated its 15th anniversary last year. Prupes served as president for most of his career with Symitar, up until recently when he assumed the role of chairman. At that time, Prupes said the move to the chairman role was so that he could spend more time on the sales and marketing side of the business. Despite Symitar's success, Prupes was adamant about not growing the company too fast. "There's a lot to keep track of in this industry, so we've always kept our growth in check, not wanting our service to customers to suffer," said Prupes in an interview with Credit Union Times last year (CU Times, May 19, 1999). Prupes was truly a lifetime supporter of credit unions, having worked with credit unions in some form or another for 33 years. After graduating from Valley College with a degree in Business Administration, he coordinated the Technicolor Employees Federal Credit Union conversion to an online data processing system in 1966. In 1970 he converted and trained 18 credit unions for Inter-Continental Computing, Inc. From there, Prupes went on to Complete Business Services, Inc. (CBSI), where he established the company's presence in central and northern California. He also earned the position of Vice President of Sales and Marketing. In 1978 he directed the development of an in-house system at CBSI. It was in 1980 that CBSI was acquired by Citicorp Information Resources. This merger brought Prupes a new role as General Manager, where he continued his business development duties and was solely responsible for growing the client base from zero to nearly 100 credit unions. Prupes then started thinking about forming his own company. "We thought we had some better ideas in building a better mousetrap. We had done this before for credit unions, so why not?" said Prupes during the May interview with Credit Union Times. Though one of three founders of Symitar, his co-founders acknowledge Prupes as the single visionary for the creation of Symitar. "It was his idea to start Symitar, and many of his dreams and values live on in Symitar," said Symitar Vice Chairman John Landis, who co-founded Symitar with Prupes and Vice Chairman David Held 16 years ago. "He taught me, and most of us here, how to value client relationships and how to settle for nothing less than the best service we could possibly deliver," said Landis. Prupes was proud of the fact that Symitar did not engage in any of the merger and acquisition activity that swept through the credit union industry in the last few years. Prupes also maintained that Symitar would not market its system outside of the credit union industry. A memorial service was held for Prupes on March 1 at the El Camino Memorial Park and Mortuary in San Diego. Prupes is survived by his wife Jan and his two daughters. His family has asked that all donations go to the Leukemia Society of America in his name. The address is: Leukemia Society of America, 4715 Viewridge Avenue, San Diego, CA 92123. -
pgentile@cutimes.com
