Hani Abouhalka

Company Group Chairman
Johnson & Johnson

Hani Abouhalka is the Company Group Chairman for Johnson & Johnson (J&J) Medical Devices Companies, the world’s largest and most comprehensive medical technology business. He is responsible for the company’s Medical Device businesses in Europe, Middle East & Africa (EMEA), which includes surgical technology, orthopaedics, cardiovascular and speciality solutions directed at delivering clinical and economic value to healthcare systems. A purpose-driven and global leader, Hani brings with him an outstanding 20-year record of driving transformational growth across EMEA’s developed and emerging markets, building high-performing teams and championing Johnson & Johnson values.

Paul Bateman

CEO
Proverum Ltd

Paul has over 25 years’ experience in the medical device industry, the last 20 years of which have been working with ‘start-up’ companies, where he has raised over $50 million in venture funding and $15 million from capital markets. Most recently Paul was CEO of Novate Medical, overseeing the successful development of the Sentry bio-convertible IVC filter and subsequent acquisition of the company by BTG plc in September 2018. Prior to Novate, Paul was CEO of Genosis plc, where he led the IPO of the company on the AIM of the London Stock Exchange.

Serge Bernasconi

CEO
MedTech Europe

Serge Bernasconi has more than 30 years of experience in the world of pharmaceuticals and medical devices, working in companies such as Johnson & Johnson, Schering Plough in US and Europe, and more recently Medtronic. In his capacity as President & International Regional Vice President of Medtronic France, he was elected President of APIDIM (The French Association for the Promotion of Innovation in Medical Devices), and Vice President and Treasurer of SNITEM (French Medical Technology Industry Association).

Michael Branagan-Harris

CEO
Device Access UK

Michael founded Device Access UK in 2010 following more than 30 years experience in the sales and marketing of medical devices. Since 2010 he has driven the 30+ successful applications for NICE approvals and the submission of more than 1000 cases for change in the NHS. Michael was one of the first qualified and approved NICE Meta Tool® facilitators.

David Cassak

Co-Editor-in-Chief & Managing Partner
MedTech Strategist

David has more than 30 years of experience in the healthcare industry. Cassak co-founded Windhover Information Inc., along with his partner, Roger Longman, in which they spun out exceptional publications such as IN VIVO, START-UP, Medtech Insight, Emerging Medical Ventures and The RPM Report. Cassak also served as Vice President, Content, and Managing Director, Medical Devices for Elsevier Business Intelligence, a Reed Elsevier Company, including the publications The Gray Sheet and The Pink Sheet.  He is a frequent speaker before various companies and trade groups within the medical device industry and is widely known for his vast knowledge and reporting in MedTech.

Ginny Cassidy

Director, Enterprise Sustainability Program
Medtronic PLC

Ginny Cassidy is director of the Enterprise Sustainability Program at Medtronic PLC, a global leader in medical technology. In her role, Ginny advances Medtronic’s environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance by driving the company’s corporate sustainability  governance, strategy, risk assessment, and disclosure. Ginny joined Medtronic in 2006 in a communications role and led Medtronic’s sustainability reporting from 2008-2015 before transitioning to her role as program director.

Alexandros Charitou

Associate Partner
EY
UK & I Life Science Commercial Access MedTech Lead
EY

Alexandros Charitou is an Associate Partner in the EY Global Life Sciences Practice, with more than 25 years of experience in healthcare and life sciences, he leads a team providing expertise and support across the MedTech product lifecycle, in strategic commercial assessments, clinical advisory, and regulatory strategy as well as patient safety. He has a special interest in software as a medical device, wearables and device drug-device combination products. He has worked extensively with medical affairs and safety teams as well as European regulators and as a former Notified body in-house clinician, Alexandros is a subject matter expert on the new European Medical Device and In Vitro Diagnostic Regulations. Alexandros studied medicine at the Royal Free Hospital in London and followed on with higher surgical training in cardiothoracic and major trauma surgery. He was a cardiothoracic surgeon in the UK and clinical lead for chest trauma, responsible for developing and running the chest trauma service at one of London's major trauma centers.

Tak Cheung

Principal
NEA

Tak joined NEA in 2018 as a Principal on the healthcare team. He focuses on medical device investments. Prior to NEA, Tak was a Venture Partner at Merieux Development Venture Fund where he led all phases of investment for healthcare startups, including sourcing, diligence and investment approvals. Tak also co-founded Lexington Medical, a commercial-stage medical device startup in the gastrointestinal surgery space. Prior to Merieux and Lexington, Tak was VP of Business Development for the Global Surgical Division at Bausch & Lomb, and was responsible for all business development efforts in the ophthalmic surgical division. Tak has held various corporate and business development leadership roles at Edwards Lifesciences in the Heart Valve Therapy Division and Advanced Medical Optics (acquired by Johnson & Johnson). Tak received a BS with Honors in Engineering and Applied Science from the California Institute of Technology, an MD from the University of California, Irvine, and an MBA from Harvar

Christopher Cleary

Vice President Corporate Development
Medtronic

Chris Cleary is Vice President of Corporate Development for Medtronic. During 2014, Chris led the corporate development efforts for Medtronic’s $43B acquisition of Covidien. Since then, Medtronic has acquired over 30 businesses for more than $3 billion, and made more than 20 investments in companies and funds in excess of $170 million. Prior to 2014, Chris was CEO of Alesia Capital Services, and worked at GE Capital from 1995 to 2011, leading M&A teams that closed acquisitions worth $60 billion of financial assets across more than 200 transactions.

Gloria Crispino

CEO & Director of Biostatistics
StatisticaMedica

Dr. Gloria Crispino is the founder and CEO of StatisticaMedica Ltd - 2011 to present. Gloria has acquired over fifteen years of experience in conducting research, consulting and in education in the fields of biostatistics, both in academia and industry, in Europe and the USA.

Jan De Backer

CEO
FLUIDDA

Jan De Backer graduated from Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands as aerospace engineer. He attained an MSc degree in aerodynamics and specialized in applied biomedical computational fluid dynamics leading to a PhD from the University of Antwerp, Belgium. He is an alumnus of the MBA programs at London Business School, London and Columbia Business School, New York. Dr. De Backer has received several awards for his innovative research in the field of airway modeling in respiratory and sleep medicine. His work has been published in international journals. Dr. De Backer founded FLUIDDA in 2005 and he has held the position of Chief Executive Officer since 2007.

Paul Dimmock

Senior Technical Adviser
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE)

*Bio coming soon!

Janke Dittmer

General Partner
Gilde Healthcare

Janke Dittmer joined Gilde in 2011 as a Partner. He is focusing on Digital and Home Health, MedTech and Diagnostics investments. He currently represents Gilde on the board of Volta Medical, Big Health, FIRE1, Lumeon and Nyxoah. He served on the supervisory board of Definiens and Sapiens until trade sale. Prior to joining, he was a Venture General Manager and Head of Business Development & Strategy within Philips' Corporate Venturing unit in Healthcare. He served as an Engagement Manager at McKinsey & Company. Prior to this, he cofounded a Nanotech company in the Silicon Valley after serving as a Fellow at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. He earned a PhD in Physics from the University of Cambridge in the UK and was a Post-Doc in Nanotechnology at the University of California, Berkeley.

David Filmore

Executive Editor
Market Pathways

David has been covering the medical technology sector as a writer and editor for about 20 years, previously serving as the executive editor/editor-in-chief of industry-leading publications The Gray Sheet and Medtech Insight. He specializes in the regulatory and reimbursement dynamics that impact device and diagnostics companies' ability to succeed in the marketplace. Earlier in his career, David was an editor with the American Chemical Society, producing content for professionals in the pharmaceutical industry and analytical instrumentation space, and he has also worked in the pharmaceutical industry.

Dr. Peter J. Fitzgerald

Emeritus Professor of Medicine & Engineering
Stanford University School of Medicine
Co-Founder & Managing Partner
Triventures

Dr. Peter Fitzgerald is Director of the Center for Cardiovascular Technology at Stanford University Medical School, and Co-founder/Managing Partner at Triventures. He is an Interventional Cardiologist and has a PhD in Engineering.  He is Professor Emeritus in the Departments of Medicine and Engineering at Stanford. He has led or participated in over 150 clinical trials, published over 450 manuscripts/chapters, and lectures worldwide.  Peter has been principle/founder of 24 healthcare companies in Silicon Valley, has transitioned 18 of these start-ups to medium/large-cap life science companies and remains on several of their advisory boards.  He has been a consultant for the FDA for the past 15 years focused on medical technology and more recently, digital health.

Arthur Franken

General Partner
Gilde Healthcare

Arthur Franken joined Gilde in 2001. He is focusing on venture and growth capital investments in the biopharm, medtech, diagnostics and digital health sectors. He represents Gilde on the boards of Breath Therapeutics, Calypso, Levicept, Moximed and Symphogen and served as a board member for FlowCardia, MTM Laboratories, ProQR Therapeutics and STAT-Dx until the trade sales or IPO. Prior to joining Gilde he was active in cardiovascular research at the Leiden/Amsterdam Center for Drug Research and TNO. He holds a master’s degree in Biopharmaceutical Sciences from Leiden University, the Netherlands.

Hanson S. Gifford, III

Partner
Lightstone Ventures

Hanson is a Partner of LSV. He assists the LSV medical device team with deal sourcing, due diligence, and portfolio company management. He has served in this role since November 2013. Hanson is also a Managing Partner at The Foundry, LLC, a medical device company incubator and a preferred partner to LSV. Since its inception in 1998, Hanson has led The Foundry in all of its activities. Prior to The Foundry, Hanson was Vice President of Research and Development at Heartport, Inc., which had a successful IPO in 1996. From 1993-1998, he built and led a 62-person team at Heartport developing a wide variety of novel devices and procedures for minimally invasive cardiac surgery. In 1992-1993, Hanson co-founded and served as Managing Director of Bavaria Medizin Technologie, GmbH in Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany. In 1991, Hanson co-founded and served as President of Cardiovascular Therapeutic Technologies (acquired by Eli Lilly). From 1985-1990, Hanson worked at Devices for Vascular Intervention (acquired by Eli Lilly) in various engineering, clinical research and marketing capacities. Before joining DVI, Hanson worked in engineering roles at Oximetrix and General Dynamics. Hanson is a named inventor on over 360 issued US patents. Hanson is a Director of FIRE1, Contego, Reprieve Cardiovascular, Half Moon Medical, Tangible Science, and Foundry Therapeutics 2.

Andrew Glass

CEO
Vivasure Medical

Andrew is the CEO of Vivasure Medical, a leading cardiovascular medical device company in Galway, Ireland. As CEO he has been instrumental in taking the company global and setting it up for success in the United States. With over 15 years healthcare experience, previous to Vivasure Andrew was a senior executive for Abbott Laboratories managing its European medical device business. Previously Andrew held roles in China and the Unites States, including Director of Marketing, General Manager Hong Kong & Taiwan, Director Asia Pacific Business Development, among others. Andrew has also worked for Johnson & Johnson and as a management consultant.

Paul Grand

Founder & CEO
MedTech Innovator

Paul is the founder and CEO of MedTech Innovator. He created and managed MedTech Innovator as a program within RCT Ventures from 2013 – 2016. In 2016, with the financial support of RCT and other sponsors, Paul left to run MedTech Innovator as a stand-alone company. He spent 11 years as Director and Managing Director at RCT Ventures, the investment arm of Research Corporation Technologies, Inc. Prior to RCT, Paul was co-founder and CEO of startups in the medtech, pharma, and tech sectors.

Timothy Haines

Chairman & Managing Partner
Abingworth

Tim is Chairman and Managing Partner at Abingworth LLP, a leading global life sciences venture investment firm. Tim joined Abingworth in 2005 having been Chief Executive of Abingworth’s portfolio company, Astex Therapeutics, and was instrumental in establishing it as one of the leading UK biotechnology companies. Tim has held a number of senior management positions in the US and Europe, including CEO of both Datascope Corp. and Thackray Inc, and General Manager at Baxter UK. Tim has a BSc from Exeter University and an MBA from INSEAD. He is a former Director of the BIA and sat on the BVCA Venture Committee and the Wellcome Trust / NHS Health Innovation Challenge Fund. During his time at Abingworth Tim has taken board roles in a number of companies including Adaptate Biotherapeutics, Astex, Fovea, GammaDelta Therapeutics, MEDIAN Technologies, PowderMed, and Sientra.

Chip Hance

CEO
Regatta Medical

A medical device industry veteran with more than 25 years experience, before Regatta Medical, Chip was CEO of Creganna Medical, a leading Ireland based supplier to the minimally invasive medical device industry. After a successful three-year effort to focus the company on higher growth markets and improve operational performance, Creganna Medical was sold to TE Connectivity, in 2016. Preceding Creganna, Mr. Hance was an Entrepreneur-in-Residence within the FDA at CDRH in 2012-13. He co-led the Innovation Pathway team focused on streamlining aspects of medical device clinical trials in the U.S. Prior to his FDA experience, Hance was most recently President of Abbott Vascular, the cardiovascular device division of Abbott. Over a decade in interventional cardiology at Abbott Vascular, Hance led the organization from a small vessel closure business through acquisitions and organic growth and ultimately to global leadership in the drug-eluting stent market with the launch of Xience in the U.S., Japan, and China. Abbott Vascular became a multi-billion dollar division of Abbott.

Alan Hobbs

Manager High Potential Start Ups
Enterprise Ireland

Alan manages the Irish Government’s life science High Potential Start-Up team who work with the best emerging Bio, Pharma and Medical Device companies in Ireland. He has 30 years global experience living and working in China, Silicon Valley, Taiwan, Korea and Ireland. Alan started his career working for IDA Ireland targeting “C” level executives in US and Asian Multinationals, selling Ireland as a HQ for their EMEA activities, he crossed over to the domestic side of economic development with roles in High Growth Markets, Corporate Communications and the Food sector. MBA graduate from Trinity College Dublin.  

Steven Hochberg

Partner
Deerfield Management

As a Partner on the Private Transactions team at Deerfield, Steve joined Deerfield in 2013 to work on structured transactions in Deerfield’s Private Design Funds. Steve has been a founder and manager of healthcare companies for more than 20 years. Since 2004, Steve has managed Ascent Biomedical Ventures, a leading venture capital firm he co-founded focused on early stage investment and development of biomedical companies. Since 2011, Steve has been the Chairman of the Board of Continuum Health Partners until its merger with Mount Sinai in 2013, where he is the Senior Vice Chairman of the Mount Sinai Health System, a non-profit healthcare integrated delivery system in New York City with over $5 Billion in annual revenues. He graduated from the University of Michigan and earned his M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Jonas Jendi

Investment Director
Industrifonden

Jonas has been focused on the commercialization of life science innovation for about 20 years. Between 2001 and 2010, Jonas was the CEO of Cogmed, a start-up in the field of evidence-based cognitive training (clinically validated software), based in Stockholm and later in the US. Cogmed came out of Karolinska Innovation and was the first Karolinska Development portfolio company to be sold. Jonas took the company from the research phase at the Karolinska Institute in 2001, to acquisition by Pearson, in 2010. Before joining Industrifonden in 2017, Jonas also held various advisor and board member roles, in both early stage and public companies, and across digital health (such as Shim, acquired by Kry), medtech and biotech (such as Bioinvent). His background also includes strategy work with The Boston Consulting Group. Jonas holds a M.Sc. from the Stockholm School of Economics.

Jeff Jump

Chairman & CEO
MedAlliance Swiss Medical Technology

Jeff has nearly 40 years’ experience of the international medical devices industry, 15 years of which have been at Board level. He is the former CEO of SGX publicly listed company Biosensors where he spent 13 years, which during this time grew from a start-up to become the fourth largest supplier of cardiac stents in the world. In addition to President and CEO he served as a Board Director and Chairman of Biosensors Europe.Jeff has also been a Non-Executive Director of various medical device companies including Symetis (sold to Boston Scientific), PneumRx (sold to BTG), Maya (sold to Covidien), Benechill, Anecova, Veryan and ARTS and former Chairman of Combioxin S.A. He is currently serving as an Independent Board Director for Impulse Dynamics and Chairman of Aleva Neuro S.A.

Rosanne Longmore

CEO
Coroflo

Rosanne has 15 years experience in financial services and has worked across different business units including wealth management and client service operations. Having qualified from the University of Limerick, Rosanne completed further industry qualifications with the Institute of Project Management and the Institute of Bankers.
Rosanne has an impressive track record in analysing multi-layer operational issues across organisations, liaising with stakeholders and providing workable and efficient solutions. From a people and practical perspective, Rosanne has managed teams in demanding, target-driven, results-focused environments to achieve strategic improvements and progress.

Amit Kukreja

Vice President Corporate Market Access
Masimo

*Bio coming soon!

Howard Levin

CEO
Deerfield Catalyst

A veteran in the field of biomedical engineering and cardiology, with a specialty in heart failure and transplantation, Dr. Levin brings more than 35 years of clinical and commercial healthcare experience to his role. In 2003, with Mark Gelfand, Dr. Levin co-founded Coridea. His inventions and co-inventions have successfully launched or their patents helped launch companies including Ardian (Medtronic), CHF Solutions (Gambro), Respicardia (formerly, Cardiac Concepts), eValve (Abbott) and RenalGuard/Reprieve Cardiovascular (PLC Medical), Cibiem and Soffio Medical. He has held a number of positions in these companies including President, Chief Scientific Officer, Chief Medical Officer and VP of R&D. Dr. Levin received his M.D. from the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine and his training in cardiology at The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. He also has a master’s degree in Biomedical Engineering.

Stephen Levin

Co-Editor-in-Chief & Managing Partner
MedTech Strategist
Market Pathways

Stephen served as Executive Editor & General Counsel at Windhover Information followed by Editor-in-Chief of Medical Devices for Elsevier Business Intelligence, where he directed the company’s editorial coverage of the medical device industry. Before that, Stephen was Senior Counsel to the US Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, where he directed Senate investigations into a wide variety of areas including health care fraud and abuse, international organized crime, and corruption in federal contracting programs, while also participating in other Senate investigations including the Whitewater inquiry.  Before joining the Subcommittee, he was with the Federal Election Commission and the Department of Justice.

Jennifer McMahon

Principal
Seroba Life Sciences

Jennifer McMahon joined the Seroba team in 2011. She graduated from UCD with an honours degree in Pharmacology in 2010. Jennifer then entered a masters degree programme in Biotechnology and Business to further her interest in the interface of biomedical science with commercialisation. Having placed first in her masters degree in 2011, Jennifer then joined Seroba’s Investment Team as an Investment Analyst and was appointed Senior Analyst in 2014, Associate in 2016 and Principal in 2019. In 2019, Jennifer joined the Advisory Board for the European healthcare Businesswomen’s Association.  She guest lectures on venture capital at University College Dublin, Trinity College Dublin and the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.  She  also speaks regularly at Investor/Entrepreneur partnering conferences across Europe.  Jennifer sits on the board of Endotronix.

Jenny Melia

Divisional Manager - High Potential Start-Ups
Enterprise Ireland

Jenny Melia joined Enterprise Ireland in 1996 after completing a BSc and PhD in Chemistry in UCD. She initially joined the Research and Innovation Division as a commercialisation specialist based in Trinity College Dublin. Jenny originally planned to stay with the organisation for two years but loved working with companies on their innovation agendas. Twenty three years later, she is as passionate and committed to helping Irish companies to innovate and grow as ever. Jenny subsequently managed Enterprise Ireland’s national research and technology programmes between industry and third-level research institutes. As the Irish liaison for EU nanotech and advanced materials funding programmes, she was appointed by the EU Commissioner to their high level advisory group. Jenny then spent a rewarding seven years working with Enterprise Ireland’s food and beverage clients – including start-ups, quickly scaling companies and global players. She later managed the team, working with SMEs across all sectors and regions. Jenny joined the High Potential Start-Up team in May 2019. Originally from Rathangan. Co. Kildare, she continues to live nearby, in a small and scenic townland in the countryside called Knavinstown.

Alan Merriman

Executive Chairman
Elkstone Partners

Alan is the founder of Elkstone Private and the Executive Chairman of Elkstone Partners. He oversees and leads all the group’s activities. Alan was formerly FD at EBS Bank and a senior partner at PwC.

John Milad

CEO
Quanta Dialysis Technologies

John is CEO, founding Board Member and an original investor in Quanta Dialysis Technologies. He had the initial vision that the industrial technology concept of a fluid management system could be transformed into a disruptive medical technology in the dialysis market worth $82B. The dialysis market has suffered from a lack of innovation over the last 30 years. Under John’s leadership, SC+, Quanta’s small, simple and versatile haemodialysis system has gone from concept to reality with customers from across the NHS using the device across a range of modalities from ICU, to dialysis centres and the home.

John O’Dea

CEO
Palliare

John has 30 years’ experience in the medical device industry and is CEO of the Palliare group of companies. John previously worked at Medtronic following their 2017 acquisition of GI Diagnostic company Crospon, which he founded in 2006. John co-founded Caradyne, an Irish respiratory medical device company, which was acquired by Respironics, Inc. in 2004. Over the past 35 years, John has held R&D management positions in Nellcor Puritan Bennett and engineering positions in Digital Equipment, Inc. and Dataproducts, Inc. John is a named author on 18 U.S. Patents. John is Chairman of the External Advisory Board of BioInnovate Ireland at NUI Galway. He is a past Chairman of the Board of the Irish Medical Devices Association and is a Past President of Engineers Ireland. In 2016, John was awarded a Doctor of Engineering (honoris causa) by NUI Galway for his contribution to the Irish medical device industry and received the 2016 Outstanding Contribution to MedTech Award from the Irish MedTech Association, IDA Ireland, and Enterprise Ireland.

Daniel O’Mahony

Partner
Seroba Life Sciences

Daniel O’Mahony is a Partner at Seroba Life Sciences and brings a wealth of experience in product development, strategic planning, licensing, corporate venturing, intellectual property management and commercialisation. Dr O'Mahony currently sits on the board of Atlantic Therapeutics, MedLumics, Novate Medical and PQ Bypass.  He previously sat on the boards of Apica Cardiovascular (acquired by Thoratec), Covagen (acquired by Cilag/Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of the Johnson & Johnson Group), Stokes Bio (acquired by Life Technologies), Straatum (acquired by Lam Research Corporation).

Antoine Papiernik

Chairman & Managing Partner
Sofinnova Partners

Antoine Papiernik is Chairman and Managing Partner at Sofinnova Partners, which he joined in 1997. Antoine has been an initial investor and active board member in public companies like Actelion, ProQR, Shockwave Medical, NovusPharma (sold to CTI), Movetis (sold to Shire), Mainstay, Pixium Vision and Stentys, which went public respectively on the Zürich stock exchange, the NASDAQ, the Milan Nuovo Mercato, the Belgium Stock Exchange and the EuroNext Paris, in Cotherix (initially NASDAQ listed, then sold to Actelion), CoreValve (sold to Medtronic), Fovea (sold to Sanofi Aventis), Ethical Oncology Science (EOS, sold to Clovis Oncology) and Recor Medical (sold to Otsuka). He has also invested in and is a board member of private companies Reflexion Medical, Tissium, Pi-Cardia, SafeHeal, Noema Therapeutics, Ablacare, Highlife and Rgenix. Antoine has an MBA from the Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania. He has been selected twice for the Forbes Midas List, an annual ranking recognizing the world’s top venture capital investors. Antoine is one of the few Europeans and life science investors to have been named to the prestigious list.

Jan Pensaert

Managing Partner
Valiance

Jan is the Founding Managing Partner of Valiance. He brings over 20 years of experience in growth investing. He leads the Investment Committee for the Valiance Funds and is responsible for all aspects of the Funds’ investment processes. Jan currently serves on the Board of several Valiance entities funds and portfolio companies including MDxHealth, JenaValve, MyCartis and 4Tech. Prior to founding Valiance, Jan was CEO of La Fayette, where during his tenure the La Fayette Funds increased in AUM from $750 million to $5.5 billion. Before that, he was responsible for the Permal Group’s European-based investment management and research activities, and prior to that he worked at Lazard in Corporate Finance M&A. Jan holds a BA in Business Economics from Gent University in Belgium, and a Masters in Banking & Finance from the University of Aix-Marseille, France.

Anne Portwich

Partner
LSP

Anne Portwich, PhD, has been with LSP since 2001. She is a Partner in LSP’s Amsterdam office. Her prime focus and responsibility within LSP is to invest in unlisted securities. Over the years, she has been responsible for investments in numerous portfolio companies of LSP. She also played an essential role in raising LSP Health Economics Fund 2 in 2017, the largest European fund dedicated to medical technology with a fund size of EUR 280 million.

Stephen Prendiville

Head of Sustainability
EY Ireland

Stephen leads EY Ireland’s Sustainability business. Driving forward both EY Ireland’s own carbon negative and net zero strategy internally, while also ensuring our clients gain the maximum value from EY professionals experienced in sustainability and related services. Originally from Limerick, Stephen move to Canada in 2011 where he worked with large cities (including Toronto, Calgary, Vancouver, Edmonton, Montreal and Ottawa) to deliver sustainable mobility solutions as well as climate resilience advisory services. Passionate about the provision of higher order electrified public transport and compact urban design, and its role in tackling poverty and homelessness, Stephen has dedicated his professional career to network system thinking – considering the implications of multiple trends and disruptions for planning and strategy development for clients. Notably, Stephen has also undertaken significant infrastructure development and related policy development initiatives for the advance of the circular economy. Stephen returned to Ireland in the Summer of 2020 to lead EY Ireland’s ambitious climate action agenda and the growth of its sustainability services for our clients.

Thom Rasche

Partner
Earlybird Venture Capital

Thom Rasche has been a partner at Earlybird Venture Capital since 2007 where he focuses on the healthcare technology sector. Mr. Rasche joined Earlybird Venture Capital GmbH & Co as a Venture Partner in 2003. Since he joined Earlybird, he has been responsible for the medical device portfolio and for making new investments in this area.

Helen Ryan

Life Science Advisor
Atlantic Bridge University Bridge Fund

Helen has over 25 years’ experience in the Medical device industry including as Chief Executive Officer of Creganna Medical and Product Development and Research roles at Medtronic and Covidien. She has demonstrated the ability to scale, including acquiring and integrating companies, establishing strategic joint ventures and raising of debt and equity financing. During her time as CEO of Creganna Medical the company grew five-fold, to become the largest indigenous medical device company. She now works with Irish companies supporting them to scale. She acts as a strategic advisor to Atlantic Bridge Ventures on their University Bridge Fund and serves as a director for Enterprise Ireland. She works as an advisor and a director for a number of early stage and scaling companies and charities. She is currently the Chair of the Implementation Group on Police Reform, based in the Department of the Taoiseach, having recently served as a member of the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland.

Caroline Sai

European Network Coordinator
EIT Health

Caroline is the European coordinator of the EIT Health Investor Network - a European network of Early stage healthcare investors to support and accelerate the fundraising of our startups up to 10 M€.

Diana Saraceni

Founder & Managing Partner
Panakes Partners

Founder of Panakes, Diana has over 20 years of international experience in managing Venture Capital investment funds, through which she invested in over 60 start-ups across Europe. After several years of experience in the strategic consultancy sector at A.T. Kearney, Diana worked as Senior Advisor in the Investment Banking division of Lazard. In 2001 she co-founded 360 Capital Partners, a leading pan-European Venture Capital firm. She is a member of several national and international committees (EU and US) for the selection and promotion of innovative start-ups. She has also co-founded and chaired the International Venture Club, an association that brings together the main European venture capital firms. She is frequently involved as Scientific Advisor to Life Sciences conferences and acting in or chairing juries for the allocation of public funds at Italian, European and US level (i.e. Premio Marzotto, Life Star Awards, EIC H2020 and National Cancer Institute-SBIR initiative).

Heather Simonsen

President
PQ Bypass

Heather has almost 30 years of experience in the healthcare industry. She has served in senior roles for venture-funded medtech startups and Fortune 500 companies such as Abbott and Johnson & Johnson. Heather completed the Executive Program at Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business and holds an MBA from Chicago’s DePaul School of Business. She has held board positions with the Medical Marketing Association, Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association, and is on the founders’ board of advisors for the Stanford University-affiliated StartX Accelerator.

Julie Sinnamon

CEO
Enterprise Ireland

Julie Sinnamon is CEO of Enterprise Ireland, a government agency responsible for the growth of Irish-owned businesses in global markets. Prior to her appointment to CEO in November 2013, Julie held a number of senior public sector positions, spanning a 30 year career in Enterprise Ireland and IDA Ireland.

John Thompson

CEO
AuriGen Medical Ltd

John Thompson is CEO of AuriGen Medical, a pre-clinical Medtech company built with a mission to deliver pioneering, life changing solutions for patients with Atrial Fibrillation. By leveraging existing minimally invasive techniques, our exceptional team of 20 medtech specialists based in Galway have developed the AuriGen Affix device to quickly occlude the LAA, while simultaneously treating the abnormal electrical activity causing AF restoring normal sinus rhythm. Using non-thermal pulsed-field ablation or PFA, we can for the first time selectively treat the heart cells responsible for afib, making patient treatment faster, safer, and more cost effective

Brad Vale

Founder
Treo Ventures

Brad Vale is a founder and general partner at Treo Ventures, which he and Mudit Jain launched in 2018 to collaborate with entrepreneurs and co-investors on building innovative medical device companies.  He previously spent 30 years at JNJ in research, product development and venture investing across all of JNJ’s businesses in consumer health, biotech, and medical devices.  Brad’s business experiences include preclinical testing, project management, incubator and venture fund formation and management, spinouts, and strategic investing.  He completed his PhD in Biomedical Engineering at Iowa State University and his Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degrees at Washington State University.

Rupert Winckler

Head of EMEA Business Development
Olympus

Based in Hamburg, Germany, Rupert leads business development activities for Olympus in the EMEA region. His team is responsible for sourcing and executing deals including investments, partnerships, acquisitions and other transactions in EMEA. Prior to joining Olympus in 2017, Rupert led the European Healthcare Investment Banking team at Canaccord Genuity in London. Before this, he was a senior banker at Piper Jaffray (now Piper Sandler), where he worked for ten years, as well as ING Barings, advising clients on a number of cross-border public and private M&A in the life sciences sector. He began his career in life science consulting, servicing clients in the med tech, diagnostics and biopharma sectors. Rupert holds a Masters degree in Biochemistry from the University of Oxford as well as additional qualifications in Finance.