Company Overview
We build modern technology solutions for higher education.
Our focus is simple. Help colleges and universities connect systems, reduce complexity, and maintain control over how their technology works.
Campus environments depend on a wide range of systems across access, dining, retail, housing, and more. Many of these were not designed to work together. We provide a platform that brings these systems into one ecosystem, allowing campuses to manage credentials, transactions, and integrations across campus without being constrained by legacy technology.
We are practitioners first, and everything we build reflects real-world, campus environment complexities we have experienced firsthand.
Company Mission
Built from real operational experience at the University of Arizona, we develop solutions that are simple, empowering and designed around institutional freedom, giving universities the flexibility they need to operate on their own terms.
Company Values
Executive Leadership
Executive Leadership
Joe Harting
President, CEO & Co-Founder
Joe co-founded FutureState after 22 years of experiencing the challenges that higher education technology failed to solve. As President & CEO, he sets the vision, builds strategic partnerships, and ensures every decision FutureState makes is grounded in real-world campus complexities.
Chris Augustine
Head of Product, Co-Founder
Chris co-founded FutureState with the belief that campus technology should be powerful and intuitive. He led the creation of CardSync and CardPulse from concept to launch, ensuring they meet real institutional needs. Combining enterprise expertise with strong design instincts, he builds solutions that are both effective and effortless to use.
Jay Summerall
Founder
Jay is a payments industry veteran and entrepreneur with deep roots in higher education technology. He founded CardSmith, a pioneering cloud-based campus card platform, which was acquired by Blackboard in 2014. He also led payments innovation at Foundry Payments (Trove), bringing decades of experience in campus commerce, SaaS, and digital transactions.
Darcy Van Patten
CTO
Darcy is CTO at the University of Arizona, where she leads digital experience, administrative, and student technologies across the institution. With over 15 years of experience in higher education technology, product design, and software development, she brings a human-centered approach to innovation and a deep understanding of large-scale digital transformation.
Bill Augustine
Certified Public Accountant
Bill is a retired Certified Public Accountant and higher education executive. He served as faculty and President at Central Wyoming College and help an executive role at the Central Arizona Project, bringing experience across academic leadership, public infrastructure, and financial oversight. His breadth of experience provides FutureState with a grounded perspective on the institutions and markets we serve.