A former chief technology officer at Thomson Reuters and industry veteran has joined Digital Asset’s executive team as its new information and technology chief.
James Powell will be responsible for directing the engineering for the blockchain specialist’s distributed ledger platform and smart contract modelling language, DAML, replacing Clyde Rodriguez at the firm.
He joins Digital Asset from private equity firm Warburg Pincus, where he was chief technology officer for the Americas. Prior to that Powell was the CTO of global data services provider Nielsen, where he migrated the firm’s services to a cloud-based infrastructure and upgraded their data science platform.
Powell worked as CTO at Thomson Reuters for eight years between 2007 and 2015 before his time at Nielsen, overseeing the company’s shared services and strategic technology initiatives.
“We are delighted that James has joined us at a pivotal time in our company’s journey as we deploy enterprise distributed ledger technology to some of the most challenging requirements in the world,” said Blythe Masters, CEO of Digital Asset.
Founded in 2014, Digital Asset has been making waves in the blockchain industry after it was chosen by the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) last year to replace its post-trade infrastructure for cash equities with its technology.
“I’m inspired to have the opportunity to lead the company’s engineering team and guide the development of products that are creating extraordinary technology-driven innovation,” added Powell. “It’s truly exciting to join Digital Asset at a pivotal time in the adoption of DLT across many industries.”