Now, 17 years later, Cantwell finds himself as Google’s Head of Supply Chain Security & Resilience. As is often the case for so many people, the first real professional experience after completing post-secondary education started him on the path to where he is now.

“I went to work for FTI Consulting, and 98% of my work probably was anti-counterfeiting,” Cantwell said. “It’s building brand integrity and brand protection programs for large multinational corporations with counterfeiting issues. And China was the place to be for that because there’s no shortage of things being counterfeited.”

After two and a half years at FTI Consulting, Cantwell found himself ready for a new challenge, shifting to Procter & Gamble where he was Senior Manager, Security for Greater China. During his nearly eight years at P&G he rose to become the Director of Security for Greater China and Japan. Quickly, his focus shifted from counterfeiting to other priorities.

“My work became crisis management and physical security and investigations. All sorts of investigations,” Cantwell said. “And then I just kind of fell in love with the idea of being a security manager. You get to work with every single department in the company. In order to be a good investigator or a good security manager, you need to understand the business, at least as well as the people who are conducting it. And that was always fun for me as well.”

Under Cantwell’s leadership, P&G built a supply chain security program focused on securing transportation – from ensuring the veracity of the product to confirming the destination is reached, reducing issues on 40% of shipment down to 0.04%. But after more than a decade of working so successfully in China, Cantwell wanted to show that his success wasn’t Sino-specific. That led him to shift to Google and a relocation to Hong Kong. He took over security there just in time for the protests that began in 2019, followed by the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“A lot of the tech industry was in China, and I was the only person in security at Google who had that close proximity to the factories and distribution centers and our transportation network,” Cantwell said. “So I informally took on the role of supply chain security manager.”

In October of 2021, Cantwell moved back to the United States, bringing his wife, Guo Ce, and his two sons, one of whom was born in Guangzhou, China, the other in Hong Kong. That move coincided with Cantwell taking on his current role at Google, a position he helped design, overseeing security for the consumer hardware supply chain consisting of products like Pixel phones, earbuds, and Nest cameras. The move came with some culture shock for the whole family.

“It was 2021 and COVID-19 was still in its prime,” Cantwell said. “It was surreal coming off the plane in San Francisco and walking through the airport. No white suits, no one taking temperatures and swabbing noses or throats. That was the first surreal moment.

“Everything in China is super convenient. Everything can be done on your phone through an app. Public transportations is (widespread) so it’s easy to get anywhere you need to go. Coming back to the United States, not everything is on an app. I live in Silicon Valley and my house is on top of a mountain and cellular service is awful. It's mind blowing. I could be in the middle of a jungle in southern China and still have cell service.”

Despite those hiccups, Cantwell couldn’t be happier with the way things turned out.

“I consider myself to be the luckiest employee at Google, and that’s because I created my job,” Cantwell said. “My boss will make room for me to do my work and fight for resources for me. I don’t have a lot of people looking over my shoulder questioning my work and the impact and the achievements. So that’s pretty fantastic.”