Don’t be surprised if you start hearing more and more about the Charlotte startup scene in the coming months. For one thing, they’re going to be celebrating it — and there’s definitely something to celebrate – when a number of local startups and startup-related organizations come together on April 4th for Charlotte’s first-ever Startup Community Celebration.

The reception and award ceremony, proposed as an annual event, is being organized by the Charlotte Entrepreneurial Alliance, which is an entrepreneur introduction network, Packard Place, Charlotte’s startup hub and incubator, and Detailed Block, the go-to source for Charlotte startup news and opinion.

The award show will celebrate everything from exits to raises to grant winners and program successes.

And the successes are there. Passport Parking raised a $6 million Series A from Grotech and Relevance back in December. Verimed, Smart Sky Networks, and CanDiag have also raised upwards of $1 million. Proctor Free was part of the Spring 2013 NC IDEA grant class. Meanwhile, RevTech Labs, the two-year-old startup accelerator at Packard Place, has graduated 15 companies, with 10 more currently in house, and is raising a 506c public fund for their companies.

It’s been almost exactly one year since I took a deep dive into the Charlotte Startup Scene. That was when I took the ExitEvent Startup Social to Packard Place for our first Charlotte Social.

It was an eye-opening night. Just under 100 entrepreneurs and investors came out to talk to one another about what was going on in Charlotte. Getting the entrepreneurs together was not a problem, thanks to Adam Hill, the Director of Packard Place, and entrepreneurs like Jim Van Fleet from it’s bspoke and Tim Cheadle from Charlotte Hackers and Founders, people who had taken it upon themselves to lead the charge in growing this fledgling startup community.

To be transparent, I cheated a little bit on the investor side, tacking the Startup Social to the end of the Southeast Venture Conference and persuading a handful of investors from the conference to walk three blocks to attend the Social.

BIG News in Startups

Historically known as a button-down banking town, Charlotte’s startup community began to emerge a few years back, although everyone involved would admit it was a struggle at the time. The Queen City found its stride in 2012, and by 2013, RevTech was in full swing, founders began meeting regularly, if informally, and BIG, the sort-of CED of Charlotte, started relaying better news it its annual entrepreneurial growth survey. BIG will recap 2013’s survey during the April 4th celebration.

There is still work to be done. Charlotte, like Wilmington and Asheville, is still seen as a place with tons of startup potential, but one with a hard time producing results in terms of exits.

In Charlotte’s case, it’s the curse of the established metro, much like what Los Angeles went through in the last 10 years while Silicon Valley rebuilt nicely from the dot-com era.

But looking at how LA’s startup scene exploded over the last few years, you can’t help but agree that Charlotte has all the ingredients – the corporate structure, the quality of life, the diversity of talent – to ignite quickly from a relatively small spark.

Hill and others like James Stewart, the founder of Detailed Block, are doing their best to maintain that spark. This celebration is the next logical step.

“Amazing Trajectory”

I met Hill when he was bringing Charlotte along into Startup America and visiting the Triangle on his own to make connections and learn how Durham and Raleigh were moving forward. As I mentioned, Hill was a huge help with last year’s ExitEvent Social. He’s a born connector, and what he’s done with Packard Place and RevTech, in the environment he’s done it in, is pretty extraordinary.

“It’s been amazing to see the trajectory of startup activity in the Charlotte region,” Hill says. “In the last year alone we’ve seen three successful startup accelerators, dozens of new companies get off the ground, and a brand new angel fund established – the Charlotte Angel Fund.”

I met James Stewart at the Startup Social in March. He went on to start his own version of a Startup Social earlier this year. Like ExitEvent’s, it caters to entrepreneurs and shuns crutches like name tags, agendas, and speakers.

“The social was small and intimate,” says Stewart. “About 20 people came out and traded stories. Most of the attendees were developers looking to see what else others were working on. The next one will be held in May.”

As the startup scene in Charlotte gains momentum, events like the April 4th Celebration and the recurring social are going to be a big part of the liftoff. Further, how those events evolve and add value will determine whether the community thrives or stagnates.

But for now, it seems to be in good hands.

Editor’s note: Joe Procopio is a serial entrepreneur, writer, and speaker. He is VP of Product at Automated Insights and the founder of startup network and news resource ExitEvent. Follow him at @jproco or read him at ://joeprocopio.com