DeviceTalks Podcast Network

DeviceTalks goes inside the union of two of the most innovative companies in the world, Google and Johnson and Johnson as they look to change the face of surgery. In this episode, we chat with Scott Huennekens, President and CEO, Verb Surgical, the robotic surgery platform spinout from Google and JNJ. Huennekens shares with us the mission of Verb, insights from his career in medical startups and w...

There's an old saying that Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did but she did it backwards and in high heels. For Nancy Briefs, Deborah DiSanzo and Martha Shadan, it's also a challenge they know well. These CEOs and medtech veterans have made the journey from the ranks of the medtech industry to the corner office, making them, sadly, a rarity in this industry where just 1 out of 7 women in...

Bill Carpou took over at OCTANe 18 months ago with the mission to increase Orange County, California's image as a technology super hub. Through programs like the Medical Device Investor Forum and a new emphasis on helping local companies stay in the area, OCTANe is one of the most innovative industry council's in the medical device space. We talked to Bill about OCTANe's upcoming event, as well as...

Jeff Burbank started NxStage Medical in 1999 on the premise that patients with chronic kidney disease would benefit from bringing hemodialysis out of the clinic and into their homes. Now, 17 years later Burbank's hypothesis has been proven out and his Lawrence, Mass.-based company is topping more than $300 million in annual sales, while making a real difference in the lives of patients. In this in...

When Jeffery McCaulley took the reigns at Smiths Medical, the company was in a slump. Several years of flat growth and a potential merger that didn’t go through, had sapped the winning spirit of the Twin Cities, Minn.- based company. However, with McCaulley’s arrival, came a renewed sense of what was possible for Smiths Medical. The medtech veteran employed several new initiatives, honed at compan...

This interview, recorded live on June 6, 2016 in St. Paul, Minn. at DeviceTalks Minnesota, is one of the funniest, most enlightening and interesting discussions we've ever had at DeviceTalks. Teleflex CEO Benson Smith takes us through his career from door-to-door salesman to CEO of 1 of the top performing medical device companies in the past five years. Listen all the way to the end to hear an unf...

Dr. Paul Walker speaks to MassDevice about his efforts to take on endotoxins and sepsis at the head of Spectral Medical, his history with the deadly condition and what’s next for the burgeoning Canadian medical device firm.

Innovative Trauma Care, a San Antonio, TX-based startup, has found a new way to stop the bleeding. The company's flagship product, the iTClamp is a hemorrhage control device for use in the extremities, scalp and neck. The device, which looks like a hair clip, seals the edges of a wound closed to stop further blood loss until the wound can be surgically repaired. We spoke to CEO Joe Brennan about t...

Novocure, the St. Helier, Jersey-based medical device company, which raised more than $158M in an IPO last year, is trying to change the way we fight cancer. Company officials say its proprietary tumor treating fields technology, marketed under the product name Optune, are a new tool in the war against some of the deadliest forms of cancer. MassDevice publisher Brian Johnson recently caught up wit...

Patrick Daly, CEO, Cohera Medical talks to MassDevice Executive Editor, Brad Perriello about starting up the absorbable surgical adhesives and sealants company, how he raised one of the largest seed rounds in history and why he's moving the company to Raleigh, NC. This episode was recorded on February 29, 2016 at DeviceTalks Raleigh.

On this episode of DeviceTalks we dive into life in the corner office with Bill Hawkins, former CEO of Medtronic and chairman of Immucor. Hawkins shares his experiences on the front lines of medicine where he has spent 25 years leading companies as diverse as start ups to the world's largest medical device company.

Martin Fitchet is responsible for R&D at JNJ's medical device unit, a tall task for anyone but appropriate for this former surgeon. In this episode of DeviceTalks, we talk about what innovation means to a behemoth like JNJ and what areas he sees in medicine that are ripe for disruption.

Clostridium difficile or C. diff. is a growing crisis in the U.S. with over 29,000 deaths and 500,000 cases annually, according to the CDC. The disease, which CDC officials warned can kill people in less than 30 days, is characterized by severe diarrhea, fever, and loss of appetite. Sadly, many elderly and infirmed patients are among the most vulnerable. Roseville, Minn.-based Rebiotix is one of a...

For a man who took a private company from $17 million in sales to a $4.5 billion publicly traded juggernaut, John Brown is a remarkably humble man. However, he is, by all intents and purposes, the man who put Stryker on the map. Today, the Kalamazoo, Mich.-based medical device company nets nearly $10 billion in annual sales. In this episode of DeviceTalks, recorded at the recent AdvaMed 2015 confe...

Big things sometimes come in small packages. For Sirtex Medical, the big thing comes in a really small package. The Australian medical device company’s flagship product - the SIR-sphere - is made up of 30 to 60 million microspheres about the size of a grain of sand, which are injected into the hepatic artery and flow into the liver where they kill tumors from the inside. In this episode of DeviceT...

Colon cancer is one of the most preventable cancers, yet it is also one of the deadliest forms of the disease. In this episode, we speak with Graham Lidgard, the Chief Science Officer, Senior Vice President of Research and Development at Exact Sciences, a Wisc. -based company that has developed a non invasive test to detect colorectal cancer without having to undergo a colonoscopy. We talk to Grah...

Before Stephen Ubl departed for a job as the chief lobbyist for the pharmaceutical industry, medtech's main man in Washington D.C. sat down with us to reflect on his time as CEO of AdvaMed. In this episode of DeviceTalks, we go deep into Ubl's background, the fights over the medical device tax, forging a new partnership with the FDA and more.

Marie Johnson turned tragedy into a mission. In 2002, the CEO of Aum Cardiovascular lost her husband to a sudden heart attack, despite the fact that he was, by all accounts, a perfectly healthy man. Fast forward 13 years and her company has commercialized a non-invasive test designed to quickly detect significant coronary stenosis called the CADence. Johnson hopes the pre FDA-approved device, whic...

Dr. Manny Villafana is one of the most successful men in the history of medical innovation, having founded four companies, including CPI/Guidant Corp. and St. Jude Medical, Inc. His most recent venture, Kips Bay Medical was supposed to be his best work yet. However, problems with the FDA and shortfalls on funding doomed the company, which shut down in September 2015. Recorded live on September 23r...

Stephen Marsh has more than 70 patents to his name but his most recent endeavor, the Airing device, may make him a household name. The Airing is a hoseless, maskless, disposable micro CPAP machine, which could one day change the game in sleep apnea. However, Marsh and company have already made quite the mark on medtech by running one of the most successful crowdfunding campaigns ever. The company...

Ten years after it was spun out of MIT, Invivo Thereapeutics and its neuro scaffold treatment for traumatic spinal cord injuries is moving closer to a reality. The company has completed enrollment of its 5 patient pilot study, which has made headlines around the world and is looking to push forward on adding more patients. In this episode of DeviceTalks, we talk to new CEO Mark Perrin about the co...

In this episode of DeviceTalks, recorded live at our DeviceTalks Boston event at Boston Scientific's corporate headquarters, we sit down with CEO Mike Mahoney to discuss the company's recent turnaround. Mahoney, who joined the company as its CEO in 2012, sat down with MassDevice's Brian Johnson to take us inside how the company has improved its performance.

Reshape Medical recently received FDA approval for its Duo balloon system for obesity. The company bills the device as an alternative to bariatric surgery for the majority of patients suffering from this global epidemic. In this episode we dig into the obesity epidemic and how ReShape Medical is looking to change the paradigm of care for patients needing to lose a significant amount of weight.

In this episode we catch up with LifeScience Alley CEO Shaye Mandle about doing business in Minnesota's world class medical device cluster. We delve into why the medical device and life sciences community clustered in the Twin Cities, what trends are developing in funding, m&a and technology in the area and, of course, where to go for a power breakfast in the area.

In this episode of DeviceTalks, we delve deeply into emotion and how teaching computers to recognize emotions led to a potentially major breakthrough in medical technology with MIT scientist and entrepreneur Rosalind Picard. Listen to hear the backstory behind her book Affective Computing, her work with artificial intelligence and pioneering wearable technology.