Medtech Talk

No, Amy Belt Raimundo didn’t blow anything up. But she knew early on in college that her initial career choice of chemistry wasn’t her true path. Instead, she earned an economics degree, and used insights learned to begin a stint in consulting. Those formative years led her to business school and a job at Guidant. In this podcast, Amy Belt Raimundo explains how asking the right questions at Guidan...

Benjamin Tsai says his initial plans – or the plans he’d been given – called on him being a doctor. But he quickly saw a greater opportunity working in the life sciences industry. Tsai made a quick run through consulting firms and business school before finding a place at Invus, an investment firm that has operated mostly out of the limelight. In this podcast, Tsai discusses his career, his outloo...

Lisa Wipperman Heine’s career in Medtech was launched when she answered a want ad in a newspaper – remember those?  That path took her to top regulatory and clinical affairs positions at several high-profile Medtechs including Acorn Cardiovascular, ev3, and Covidien. Now, Wipperman Heine sits in the CEO chair of stealthy heart failure start-up PreCardia. 

After leading a long, distinguished and successful career in Medtech Innovation, Stan Rowe chose a familiar, if not unusual, spot to “retire” – he co-founded NXT Biomedical, an incubator backed by Deerfield Capital and Johnson & Johnson. Rowe previously led the unique Advanced Technologies Unit at Edwards Lifesciences Corp., the same company that earlier had acquired his start-up, Percutaneous...

Matt Likens’ two decades-plus at Baxter cultivated in him a desire to deliver “critical therapies for life-threatening conditions.” He found great success as CEO of Ulthera, an aesthetics company using ultrasound energy, but once that company was sold to Merz he sought a way back to developing devices that can help sick people become well. He found such an opportunity at GT Medical Technologies, d...

Spoiler Alert: I missed a huge part of Merit Medical CEO Fred Lampropoulos’ life story when I did my research. I won’t say what it was, but you’ll hear it at the end. I’d fire my researcher if I had one, but instead I’ll just throw myself at the mercy of the Medtech Talk Podcast community. The good news, however, is that the thing that I missed – which would have removed Fred from Merit – didn’t h...

Santé Ventures partner James Eadie, MD, doesn’t recall the good old days of Medtech. He joined the Austin-based Venture Firm after two tours in Iraq with the Air Force where he led an ER and served as part of a “flying ICU,” airlifting wounded soldiers out of combat zones. Upon returning to the states, Eadie recognized his desire to run a company could be satisfied by investing in early-stage medi...

Earlier this month, Silicon Valley Bank released its Trends in Healthcare Investments and Exits 2019, the latest of the bank’s annual reports on the state of healthcare investing. In this podcast we talk with Report Guru (and Managing Director) Jonathan Norris about the top takeaways including: What’s the emerging hot spot for Device Start-Ups? What VCs are making Series A deals? Are Angels and Cr...

Miromatrix straddles the line between biotech and medtech. The start-up is developing a line of “ghost organs” that can be used in humans. The technology is moving fast, and Ross hopes to have clinical trials up and running by the end of 2020. The future is here. Also, I’ll announce a keynote speaker for the May 30 Medtech Conference . 

Fortune disguised as misfortune led Anne Morrissey to embark on a Medtech career. Since that start, hard work, perseverance and some helpful mentors put her on the CEO track. Today, Morrissey leads an exciting Medtech start-up that’s testing a device to stop postpartum hemorrhaging. 

Twenty years ago, Maria Sainz faced an unusual fork in her career road. She chose wisely, building an esteemed career in Medtech that included senior leadership at Guidant and CEO posts at three Medtech start-ups. In this Medtech Talk Podcast, Sainz recounts the magic of Guidant, the merger with Boston Scientific, and her rewarding – and sometimes challenging – move into being a Medtech start-up C...

Scott Whitaker, the CEO of AdvaMed, has worked in DC for close to two decades. So naturally, we  asked him for his take on what the outcome of the midterm elections means for Medtech. Does it improve chances for the repeal of the Medical Device tax? We also talked about what AdvaMed is doing to entice smaller medtechs to join.

Jim Dillon, president and CEO of Renal Guard, talks about the company’s decision to create Reprieve Cardiovascular, a start-up focusing on heart failure. Reprieve raised $7 million from outside investors, including Abiomed, and counts Serial Entrepreneur Howard Levin as chief medical officer.

Endotronix CEO Harry Rowland, PhD, co-founded the heart sensor company 11 years ago and assumed the CEO role in 2012. Over that span, the company has raised more than $100 million from VCs, found regulatory success in Europe, and now is moving toward seeking approval in the US. What lessons has the first-time CEO learned running a start-up? How has Endotronix managed discouraging news in its space...

Mano Iyer’s unorthodox path to Medtech leadership led him to Europe where he co-founded a company, joined top VC firm Sofinnova, and founded ReCor Medical to test the use of renal denervation to treat hypertension. A tumultuous decade later, the company is now part of a new player in Medtech – Otsuka. What does this mean for ReCor, Iyer, and Otsuka?

Mick Farrell’s father questioned his son’s double degree from MIT when he didn’t immediately see the opportunity facing the sleep apnea company. But the younger Farrell quickly came around and helped build ResMed into a $15 billion company, with the last five years at the helm as CEO. Today, however, Farrell has ResMed beginning to take a very different path, migrating away from pure medical devic...

In this dual podcast, we talk with leaders from the American Heart Association, Philips, UPMC, and Aphelion Capital about Cardeation Capital, a new venture fund aimed at funding start-ups in the digital health and medtech fields. How did the four entities join forces? What can they offer start-ups looking to disrupt healthcare? For more information go to aphelioncapital.net . You can also learn mo...

MedCrypt CEO Mike Kijewski is playing a long game. At the moment, he recognizes Medtech execs aren’t placing a high priority on cybersecurity of their devices. But as technology becomes more advanced – and hospitals grow more wary – he expects demand will grow. The time is coming for Medtech to take a cue from the iPhone, he says.

Medtech start-ups need more firms like Aphelion Capital, investors willing to wager as little as $200,000 to get a promising idea going. Managing Partner Ned Scheetz discusses the firm’s origins, name, and plans going forward. This is the first of a two-episode package highlighting a unique joint effort between Aphelion and other co-creators of Cardeation Capital.

Under CEO Kevin Hykes, Relievant Medsystems is racking up some wins. The company closed on a $58 million Series E round last month and this week announced the first commercial application of its Intraspect pain-relief procedure. In this podcast, Hykes doles out some valuable career advice for wanna be CEOs and talks about the technology that could turn Relievant into a Medtech powerhouse.

Ask renowned vitreoretinal surgeon and inventor Steve Charles, MD, if he considers himself a surgeon or engineer first and he’ll answer – both. In this podcast, Dr. Charles says the terms “inventor” and “innovator” aren’t job titles. Innovation and inventing are what you get when insightful people commit themselves to a lifetime of learning in engineering and medicine. He gives his view of the fut...

We were hoping to capture some real-world wisdom by putting three CEOs –Bill Facteau of Earlens, Bob Paulson of NxThera and John Stevens of HeartFlow –on a panel to share reimbursement war stories. Many of those attending the May 31st Medtech Conference think we got our wish.

In this Medtech Talk Podcast, CEO John Pedersen explains why he chose to help Augmenix roll out its SPACEOAR implant, a hydrogel that's inserted between a patient's prostate and rectum to save healthy tissue from radiation exposure. In this talk, Pedersen discusses the rise of urology - which includes the recent acquisitions of Neotract and NxThera. He also updates listeners on Augmenix&...

CEOs often are assigned skill sets that define their stage of specialty: start-up CEOs, commercial CEOs, etc. Two of our guests at the Medtech Conference in Minneapolis defied those definitions by taking start-ups through commercial launches and onto the public markets. In these interviews, Tim Herbert of Inspire Medical and Adam Elsesser of Penumbra talk about the challenges of leading a company...

Join us on Thursday at the Medtech Conference in Minneapolis to hear from Congressman Erik Paulsen . A longtime proponent of the Medtech industry, Rep. Paulsen most recently co-authored a letter asking the Trump administration to remove medical technology products from a list of Chinese imports subject to protective tariffs. The five-term Congressman also has fought against the Medical Device Tax....