MANNY VILLAFANA

Founder, St. Jude Medical

Founder, Cardiac Pacemakers

Founder, ATS Medical

Manny has a substantial track record starting companies that develop and deliver successful products to the market.

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• Cardiac Pacemakers, Inc. (CPI) revolutionized the pacemaker industry by introducing a long-life lithium iodine pacemaker, a technology still used today by 100% of the pacemaker/defibrillator market.  CPI is now owned by Boston Scientific.

• St. Jude Medical developed an innovative, mechanical, bi-leaflet heart valve that dramatically reduced the frequency of blood clots.  St. Jude is now part of Abbott Medical.

• ATS Medical further evolved the mechanical heart valve, introducing an open-pivot design and capturing a strong share of the market.  ATS is now owned by Medtronic.

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As a result, Manny has received numerous awards of recognition, including:

• The "Living Legend of Medicine" award from the World Society of CardioThoracic Surgeons.

• MDEA Lifetime Achievement Award.  (https://www.mddionline.com/manny-villafa%C3%B1a-relentless-risk-taker-and-enduring-entrepreneur)

• Inductee of the Minnesota Business Journal Hall of Fame and the Minnesota Science and Technology Hall of Fame.

PETER GOMBRICH

Co-Founder, St. Jude Medical

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Peter Gombrich is a serial entrepreneur having successfully founded three medical device companies. Under his leadership, he raised over $200 million and took several companies public. Prior to founding OncoGenesis, he founded Diamics, a women’s healthcare company focused on cervical cancer screening. From 1992 to 2006, Peter founded and led AccuMed/Molecular Diagnostics, a cytopathic laboratory products company, which he took public. From 1985 to 1992, he founded and was CEO of CliniCom, a provider of bedside clinical information, which was sold to McKesson. Prior to CliniCom, Peter founded and was CEO and Chairman of Integrated Microcircuits, an outgrowth of St. Jude Medical. From 1976 to 1982, he co-founded St. Jude Medical, the largest heart valve company in the world. Prior to St. Jude, he held various sales and marketing positions in several medical device companies including Medtronic and Beckman Instruments. Peter holds a BSc degree in electrical engineering from the University of Denver, and an MBA from the University of Denver.

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SCOTT WARD

CEO, CSI360
Former President, Medtronic Cardiovascular

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Mr. Ward has been a member of CSI360's Board of Directors since 2013 and has served as Chairman since November 2014. Mr. Ward served as the Company's Interim President and Chief Executive Officer commencing in November 2015. In August 2016, Mr. Ward was appointed President and Chief Executive Officer.

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From 2013 until 2019, Mr. Ward served as a Managing Director at SightLine Partners.  From 1981 to 2010, Mr. Ward was employed by Medtronic, Inc., and held a number of senior leadership positions. Mr. Ward was Senior Vice President and President of Medtronic’s CardioVascular business from May 2007 to November 2010. Prior to that he was Senior Vice President and President of Medtronic’s Vascular business from May 2004 to May 2007, Senior Vice President and President of Medtronic’s Neurological and Diabetes business, from February 2002 to May 2004, and was President of Medtronic’s Neurological business from January 2000 to January 2002. He was Vice President and General Manager of Medtronic’s Drug Delivery business from 1995 to 2000. Prior to that, Mr. Ward led Medtronic’s Neurological Ventures in the successful development of new therapies. Mr. Ward serves on the boards of several private companies. Until April 4, 2016, Mr. Ward was the Chairman of the Board of Creganna Medical. Mr. Ward served as a member of the Board of Surmodics, Inc., from September 2010 to March 2015.

DAVID NEUSTAEDTER
Director Venture Capital, Medtronic

Frm Director of Venture Capital, Covidien

Frm Director of Venture Capital, Stryker

As Vice President of Venture Capital at Medtronic, Dave works closely with Medtronic’s leadership to complete new venture capital investments in areas of strategic interest and socialize key developments at existing portfolio companies. Dave has completed a large number of investments over the years and serves or has served as a Director or Observer on approximately 20 Boards including superDimension, Idev, Medina, and Entellus.

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Prior to Medtronic, Dave served in similar roles at Covidien and Stryker. While at Covidien, he also led a process to prioritize white space opportunities for the company. Earlier in his career, as a healthcare-focused strategy consultant, Dave supported clients on decisions regarding acquisition opportunities and internal R&D prioritization across the medical device, diagnostic and biopharmaceutical industries. He received his Ph.D. in molecular biology from the University of British Columbia, and an MBA from Yale University, and completed post-doctoral fellowships at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.

RAY CHAUNCY

CTO, Apricity Health

Frm Director of IBM Watson Labs​

Raphael Chancey has a long track record of leading multidisciplinary teams to develop technologies for transformational uses.  He is the CTO of Apricity Health.  

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Prior to joining Apricity, he was the Director of IBM Watson Innovation Labs in Austin, TX where he was responsible for researching, innovating and advancing various cognitive and AI technologies for Watson. Recently he led his team to conceive and create an embodied cognition platform called Intu that prototyped Watson as the brain/intelligence of Robots. Before his involvement with Watson Labs, he was the Chief Architect for BPO Accelerators that focused on developing cloud-based deployment patterns bundling IBM Products that seamlessly scaled to production level environments.

He had also led a global SOA Advanced Technology team that focused on building enterprise class solutions, applications and tooling across various industries. He has filed over 20 patents and served in the United States Army as a Combat Engineer.

TAK CHEUNG

Principal, NEA

Tak joined NEA in 2018 as a Principal on the healthcare team. He focuses on medical device investments.

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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).

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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 Harvard Business School.