James Cantwell

Founder and Product Architect at RIA Ascent

Speaker

James Cantwell has spent 25 years in the gap between investment management andtechnology. He started on the investment side in New York, later led North Americanconsulting at SS&C Advent out of San Francisco, and now runs WealthTech Select, wherehe and his team help advisory firms of any size figure out how technology can get themwhere they want to go, whether that's a single project or an ongoing role as theirfractional CTO. Over the years he became the person firms called to find the right tool,the right partner or the right buyer. RIA Ascent turns that into a platform: one place whereadvisory firms, the companies that serve them and the people looking to buy or invest inthem can find each other, without waiting for an introduction. He co-hosts the AI forAdvisors podcast, sits on several company and advisory boards, and writes for a numberof wealth management outlets.

Most of his free time goes into AI too. He experiments with it every day, runs local models,builds his own agents and software, and spends a lot of time testing wealthtech productsand giving the founders feedback. He lives in Cave Creek, Arizona. As moderator, expecthim to ask the question everyone else is avoiding.