CORAL GABLES, Fla. -- Butch Buchholz, the founder and tournament chairman of the Sony Ericsson Open, announced that he will be stepping down as chairman of the event following the 2010 tournament in order to pursue new entrepreneurial opportunities.

"After discussing this with my family I have decided that this is the best time for me to step down from the Sony Ericsson Open," said Buchholz. "The event is in tremendous shape, has strong leadership in place, and has what I consider the best tournament staff in tennis."

Buchholz added, "I am really looking forward to spending more time with my family and pursuing some new opportunities. I definitely plan on remaining active in tennis, and helping to promote this wonderful sport."

Buchholz first came up with the idea for the tournament while touring as pro more than 30 years ago. The first Sony Ericsson Open was played in 1985 and since then the tournament has grown into the fifth-largest tennis tournament in the world.

Today, with a total financial commitment of $9.0 million and all the top players competing, the Sony Ericsson Open is surpassed in size and stature only by the four Grand Slams. As a 12-day event, the tournament draws over 290,000 fans annually and features a permanent stadium, hailed as being among the best in the world.

"I don't think enough can be said for what Butch has done for the sport of tennis and for the Sony Ericsson Open," said Fernando Soler, Senior vice president and managing director of IMG Tennis Worldwide. "He built the Sony Ericsson Open into one of the world's premier tennis events and with IMG's ownership over the last nine years, the event has been taken to even greater heights. I would like to wish Butch the best of luck and I know he will be successful in whatever new opportunities he wishes to pursue."

Buchholz's vision of creating a new combined men's and women's tennis event has made a tremendous impact on the world of tennis and included many tournament firsts. The event was the first outside of the Grand Slams to offer equal prize money; it was the first to introduce electric line calling; and it was the first to institute "The Championship Way," a guest services program to better assist visitors with employees who spoke five languages.

Before the Sony Ericsson Open, the only combined men's and women's events were the four Grand Slams (Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon, US Open). Combined events are now commonplace around the world.

In 2010, in addition to the Sony Ericsson Open, there will be 12 other same-week combined men's and women's events, including tournaments in Brisbane, Sydney, Memphis, Acapulco, Indian Wells, Estoril, Madrid, Eastbourne, 's-Hertogenbosch, New Haven, Beijing and Moscow.

Under Buchholz's direction the tournament has become one of the player's favorite stops on tour. The event has been named ATP Tournament of the Year by a vote of the tour players in nine of the last 11 years, and by the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour in both 1995 and 2004.

The South Florida community has benefited the most from the Sony Ericsson Open's success. With an estimated economic impact of over $300,000,000, the tournament has had as large of an economic impact of any large scale event hosted annually in the region.

The Sony Ericsson Open also generates unprecedented media exposure for the community and is televised globally in more than 150 countries and seen by over 153 million viewers. Domestically, the tournament finals have been broadcast on network television in 23 of the event's first 25 years.

But the Sony Ericsson Open is just one part of Buchholz's tennis legacy. Buchholz has long believed in giving back to the community, a philosophy he still preaches today.

In 1992, Buchholz and the late Arthur Ashe, then tennis director at Miami's Doral Hotel, formed the "Good Life Mentoring Program" in partnership with the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce, providing valuable life skills for elementary and middle school students.

The Moore Park Tennis Center in Miami became one of the venues where hundreds of youngsters would benefit from this program. When Buchholz saw that Moore Park's 50-year-old Tennis Center needed extensive renovation and reconstruction, he helped fund the project and on March 24, 2001, the Ashe-Buchholz Tennis Center at Moore Park was dedicated.

Later in 2001, Buchholz became Chairman of First Serve Inc., a concept that began in conjunction with the USTA as a way to give back to tennis by using the sport as a positive influence on the nation's youth. First Serve is a youth empowerment organization that utilizes tennis to help kids develop the skills, values, and experience they need to be responsible, productive and successful if life. The program, which was launched at the Ashe-Buchholz Tennis Center, utilizes public tennis facilities as a venue for teaching a broad range of age appropriate life skills.

Today, Buchholz remains Chairman of First Serve, which has expanded to 19 cities around the United States as well as Jamaica and South Africa. In 2010, the program will be expanded to 45 cities.

Buchholz and the Sony Ericsson Open have had a long-standing relationship with Feed the Children. In a partnership that lasted 12 years, the tournament assisted the organization in distributing over 4.4 million pounds of food valued at close to $12 million and supplemented close to 17 million meals to over 163,000 needy families.

The Sony Ericsson open continues to work with many other charitable organizations, including the Special Olympics, Baptist Children's Hospital and Habitat for Humanity.

Buchholz lives in Coral Gables, Fla., and is active in civic and charity organizations throughout South Florida. He and his wife, Marilyn, have three children: Kathy, Trey and Kristen; and five grandchildren: Brittany, Brooke and Jack Gentile, and Hayley and William Buchholz.