Matt Quintanilla '07 and Mike Potter '07

Roy H. Park School of Communications | Journalism | Television-Radio

An Ithaca College education has the careers of Matt Quintanilla ’07 and Mike Potter ’07 off to a very fast start.

“This is my dream job right here,” says Matt. “Here” is Disrupto, a two-year-old digital product development firm that Mike founded. With a client list that includes names like Samsung and the New York Knicks, Disrupto is a highly successful startup in the competitive field of digital communications.

“With our talents combined, we’re able to do some pretty cool stuff,” Mike says.

Matt, a journalism major and an editor for the Ithacan (IC’s award-winning student newspaper), discovered a passion for design, studied art in Milan, and had internships with two national news organizations.

Mike was a triple major who interned with AOL and with Industrial Light and Magic, Star Wars creator George Lucas’s visual effects studio. He once pitched a business plan to Disney CEO and Ithaca alumnus Robert Iger over lunch.

Both Mike and Matt were Park scholars in Ithaca’s Roy H. Park School of Communications. Both helped launch Megaphone, a student project to provide communication support to nonprofits.

It’s that rich palette of opportunity at Ithaca, they report, that’s been the key to Disrupto’s success.

“The biggest thing Ithaca did was expose me to different experiences,” Mike says. “I got a great education in the broad range of things I needed to become an entrepreneur and start my own business.”

Matt agrees. “Ithaca helps you expand your idea of what’s possible,” he says. “I got all the tools I needed to get me where I needed to go.”

With Disrupto, they’ve gone far, and fast. “I’m totally living my career goals,” says Mike, “and I’m incredibly happy doing it.”

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