Manny Ruiz

Background

About Manny Ruiz

Manny Ruiz is the CEO of Minivela, the first vertical shorts platform built for the U.S. Hispanic and Latin American markets, and the co-founder of Brilla Media Ventures (BMV) — a leading Latino media and entertainment company that owns Minivela and the cultural storytelling brand Nuestro Stories. As CEO, Manny leads Minivela’s partnerships, sales, and distribution across the Americas. Launched in March 2025 as a joint venture with actor Carlos Ponce and adtech conglomerate Numatec, Minivela delivers cinematic, short-form storytelling designed for a bilingual, bicultural generation. For 29 years, Manny has been a pioneering voice in Hispanic media, marketing, and entertainment — recognized for building platforms that empower Latino creators and redefine multicultural storytelling. Before Brilla Media, Manny founded and led Hispanicize, the movement and media company that literally birthed the U.S. Hispanic influencer industry and social media marketing era. Following its merger with John Leguizamo’s NGL/Urbano TV, Manny was part of the leadership team that sold the company to GoDigital in 2022. Prior to Hispanicize, Manny founded and led Hispanic PR Wire, the nation’s first Hispanic press release distribution service, which he sold (along with two sister companies) to UBM (now Informa) in 2008. Manny’s PR career began as an award-winning PR executive at Porter Novelli, where he was the national director of Hispanic media relations and co-founder of the agency's U.S. Hispanic PR practice. Before that, Manny worked as a print journalist and crime desk reporter for The Miami Herald, where in 1993 he was a co-recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for Community Journalism. Some of the Manny career honors include the Keys to the City of Miami, the Miami-Dade College Hall of Fame, the PRWeek Campaign of the Year, the Silver Anvil Award, and Hispanic PR Professional of the Year. A proud Miami native of Cuban descent, Manny holds a B.A. in History from Florida International University. He enjoys family road trips, playing guitar, ‘80s music, and preserving his family’s history — proof that storytelling runs in his DNA.