Forever Oceans announces the appointment of Ilya Cantor as the sustainable seafood company’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO). Cantor brings over two decades of experience at established multinational public and private companies and expertise in initial public offerings, capital raising, mergers and acquisitions, and technology enabled solutions and services to his new role at Forever Oceans.
“Forever Oceans’ unique system for efficiently raising sustainable seafood through advanced technologies is poised for significant growth,” says Cantor. “I’m convinced that the Company will lead a new wave of protein production from our oceans that preserves our fragile environment to feed our planet. This is a pivotal time for the company, and I look forward to helping the experienced leadership team manage and maximize this unique growth opportunity.”
Ilya brings over two decades of experience at multinational public and private companies and expertise in initial public offerings, capital raising, mergers and acquisitions, and technology-enabled solutions and services to his new role at Forever Oceans.
In addition to his deep financial expertise, Ilya has a proven track record of driving transformation and change through focused execution, often in complex and developing market environments. Ilya has extensive hands-on experience in helping high-growth technology companies scale and achieve the next level in their development, as well as expertise in leading numerous mergers and acquisitions, and driving complex organizational redesign.
Prior to joining Forever Oceans, Ilya served as CFO of Aricent, a 10,000-person global product engineering services firm that served the world’s top technology companies. Prior to his role at Aricent, Mr. Cantor served as CFO of EPAM (NYSE: EPAM), a leading software engineering and digital transformation services provider, supporting the Company’s rapid growth from 1,000 engineers to over 10,000 before taking the company public on the NYSE in 2012.
Ilya also held leadership positions at Dow Jones, serving as the CFO of the Global Wall Street Journal, and later as Executive Director of Operations, where he was responsible for the highly successful launch of the Weekend Edition and executed a strategic repositioning of the Journal’s International Editions. In addition, he served for three years as a Board Member of CNBC International, a partnership between Dow Jones and NBC.
“In addition to his deep financial expertise, Ilya has a proven track record of scaling high growth technology companies,” says Forever Oceans CEO Bill Bien. “Ilya’s strong financial and operational expertise, as well as his track record with capital markets and mergers and acquisitions will be instrumental in supporting the Company’s ambitious vision and growth objectives.”
Bien recently joined Forever Oceans as CEO after serving in leadership roles within enterprises that are focused on sustainability within the ag-tech, clean-tech, and high-tech sectors. The Company will bring its first significant harvest of its sustainably delicious seafood to the U.S. market in early 2022.