Aaron Klein is back in the game with a new startup, a Nitrogen wrinkle, 'hall of fame' RIA backers and a plan to build a better meeting for Advisors

Aaron Klein is back – funded by RIA stalwarts and fueled by some Nitrogen “misery” – with a venture aimed at taking the oxymoron out of “efficient meetings.” 

The co-founder and first CEO of Riskalyze announced today (June 23) that he founded Contio in Boise, Idaho, to create an “operating system” for meetings – both online and in-person. 

“The root of the idea came from running Riskalyze way back in 2018 with about 200 people and an average of 4.8 meetings a day. It summed up to over 37,000 meetings over twelve-and-a-half years,” he says by email.  The company was later re-named Nitrogen, and he departed in 2023. See: Six months after 'Nitrogen' reboot, Aaron Klein pulls rip cord on CEO job but will stay on board to jump-start quest for $1 billion valuation under hand-picked replacement

Contio has 10 staff currently and aims to have products on its shelf in the fall.

Brian McLaughlin, Steve Lockshin, Scott Hanson, Ric Edelman, Barnaby Grist, Yoav Zurel, Mike McDaniel, Andy Swan, Capital Eleven Ventures, and other investors were among the seed capital investors who put up $5.5 million.

One other investor is a former competitor in risk software, Eric Clarke, ex-CEO of Orion, which acquired HiddenLevers in 2021. See: Orion buys HiddenLevers after a long collaboration to get an edge over companies like Envestnet in the hotly competitive risk analysis and analytics business

He likes Klein's chances of success.

“His energy is second to none and his mission to kill broken meetings resonated,” Clarke says. “He's built a stellar team, and I'm especially excited to see how they take advisor-client and advisor-prospect conversations from ‘just okay’ to absolutely outstanding.”

Supercharging advisors

Klein says he has a big head start on helping RIAs from his work at Nitrogen, where he remains a board member.

“When we launch in the fall, there will be a special version called MeetingOS for Financial Advisors, which will have specialized AI, trained to help optimize their meetings with prospects and clients,” he says. 

"The work we did at Nitrogen was all about helping advisors have richer meetings with clients, but I'm excited to see how this can supercharge advisors who use different approaches for risk, financial planning, or performance reporting.

Contio is “building powerful AI,” he says, to manage the amorphous blob that meetings can become – and which have been worsened by AI itself.

The trick

"The big trouble areas in meetings are — do we have a few critical things to talk about versus a read- through-the- encyclopedia list of all of our organization's problems?

“Why do we not have the right people in this meeting? Why do we not have the data we need at our fingertips? Why is there no clarity around outcomes and next steps?”

“AI note takers can't really solve that problem because they just record the misery of bad meetings, and send us emails about it.”

The trick is not to bury the lede, or encourage rambling.

“We have to start back at the core, and have AI help us shape a better game plan and communicate more effectively in meetings.”

Contio takes a broad view of what constitutes a meeting. It “helps every person plan, run, and capture better meetings, ranging from impromptu huddles, to staff meetings, to client reviews, to one-on-ones, to board meetings, to all-day strategy retreats,” he says. 

Building in Boise

Klein built Riskalyze in California – a known entrepreneurial hotbed – but likes his chances in finding the right talent and culture in a state still better known for potatoes than software.

"Contio has built a team of 10 people, largely populated by seasoned AI engineers and data science experts,
with a face-to-face innovation culture in Boise, Idaho," the release states. 

“With a technology and engineering ecosystem created half a century ago by Hewlett-Packard and Micron, Boise is now home to some of the world’s best AI engineers, populating companies like Kount (acquired by Experian), Clearwater Analytics (IPO in 2021), and TSheets (acquired by Intuit).”

One person Klein is actively recruiting, he says, is his second-eldest son, who has expressed a strong interest in cybersecurity.