The Leading Difference

Daniel Powell | CEO of Spark Biomedical | The Sparrow Therapy System, Opioid Addiction, & Compassion

Daniel Powell, a 20-year veteran in the medical device community, is the CEO and co-founder of Spark Biomedical and developer of the Sparrow Therapy System. In this episode, he shares about opioid addiction and how Spark's device helps alleviate withdrawal symptoms for those in recovery, his passion for deep brain stimulation, and how he almost gave up on entrepreneurship after his first small business venture ended. 
Guest links: https://www.sparkbiomedical.com/ 
Charity supported: Threads of Love
Interested in being a guest on the show or have feedback to share? Email us at podcast@velentium.com. 
PRODUCTION CREDITSHost: Lindsey DinneenEditor: Tim OliphantProducer: Velentium
 
SHOW TRANSCRIPT
Episode 003 - Daniel Powell
Lindsey Dinneen: Hi, I'm Lindsey with Velentium and I'm talking with MedTech industry leaders on how they change lives for a better world.
Diane Bouis: The inventions and technologies are fascinating and so are the people who work with them.
Frank Jaskulke: There was a period of time where I realized, fundamentally, my job was to go hang out with really smart people that are saving lives and then do work that would help them save more lives.
Diane Bouis: I got into the business to save lives and it is incredibly motivating to work with people who are in that same business, saving or improving lives.
Duane Mancini: What better industry than where I get to wake up every day and just save people's lives.
Lindsey Dinneen: These are extraordinary people doing extraordinary work, and this is The Leading Difference.
Hello and welcome to the Leading Difference Podcast. I'm your host Lindsey, and I am excited to introduce you to my guest today, Daniel Powell. Daniel, a 20 year veteran in the medical device community, is the CEO and co-founder of Spark Biomedical, and developer of the Sparrow Therapy System, which is an FDA cleared medical device that delivers non-invasive neurostimulation to alleviate opioid withdrawal. Daniel, thank you so very much for being here today. I am so delighted to have you.
Daniel Powell: Thank you, Lindsey. It's a pleasure to be here, too.
Lindsey Dinneen: Awesome. Well, I was wondering if you don't mind starting with just a little bit about your background. What's your career path been like? How did you get into this space?
Daniel Powell: That's a great question and I, I definitely do not have a typical path here. I took the scenic route, I would say, to MedTech. I graduated from Texas A&M with a business degree, and my first job was an accounts receivable at electronic data systems at Ross Perot's old company in Plano, Texas. I was very interested in technology and I kind of spent the first. 10 years of my career trying to figure out what career I wanted. So I bounced around. I had a great opportunity to be a consultant for KPMG. I did Y2K consulting, so we sat around telling everybody it was gonna be the end of the world and it wasn't. And then I got the crazy idea to start my own internet cafe for gamers because I really wanted to be self-employed and do my own thing. And I always say that was a fantastic way to lose a lot of money. And I swore I'd never be an entrepreneur again. I was like, I'm just gonna go to work, take a paycheck, keep my head down.
And my next job was at St. Jude Medical in the neurostimulation business. And so I got a great opportunity to go into the the engineering side of all things. Even though I had a business background, I was pretty good with soft, actually, I was mediocre with software. But I got an opportunity to do requirements analysis, so, what does the product need to do to meet the user's needs? And I was really good at that and it really started a fantastic career and I really didn't get how excited I would be about the medtech industry cuz I, really was just looking for a job to not be losing money as a self-employed game store owner.
And I remember going into training, they put me in sales training and they sat there and explained how putting electrical stimula on or near the spinal cord would alleviate pain in this world of neurostimulation. And I would say I fell in love with it immediately and could never get enough learning how the mechanism of action works, all the different modalities of this type of therapy. And it's set me now here for a 20 year run, where I'm just as in love with neurostimulation today as I was back then.
Lindsey Dinneen: Oh my goodness. Wow. Well, I love your story and I love the fact that you come at this from a very interesting background and, oh my goodness, your swearing off entrepreneurial endeavors and then of course-- "never say never," I guess. Right?
Daniel Powell: Well, when Spark came about, I'd actually gone to work for a startup that failed where I met my co-founders and I hadn't been paid in nine months. But I got along with my co-founder so well, and it was the worst time in the world to start a business. So you can imagine the conversation with my wife was like, "I know I haven't brought home a paycheck in nine months and I'm coming out of a failed startup. But what if we started our own company?" But we've never regretted it. It's just been an amazing four and a half years.
Lindsey Dinneen: Oh my gosh. That's amazing. Well, I would love, if you don't mind sharing about what you're up to now and this amazing new venture that you're on, and how has that all come about? I mean, obviously you must have had some highs and lows even there, so I'd love to hear the story of Spark.
Daniel Powell: Yeah. It's been quite a journey. So what was interesting is my two co-founders, Navid and Alejandro, were exploring how to do auricular nerve stim, so stimulating the cranial nerves around the ear. And we had a wide selection of different things we could go after. Navid's PhD work was in vagus nerves stim for stroke recovery, and we know vagus nerves stim works for depression and epilepsy and a wide range of disease states. But what really set us in motion as we saw another product, just by happenstance, a friend of mine was selling trans magnetic stim to a psychiatrist who had used acupuncture needles to alleviate withdrawal-- an an electrified acupuncture needle. So they were kind of creating a way of delivering electrical stim to the nervous system.
And they showed me a video of a young lady going through withdrawal and a time lapse over 30 to 60 minutes and this young lady went from clearly uncomfortable, snot running down her face, squirming in her chair. You can tell when someone's in absolute misery and she was an opioid withdrawal. And then 60 minutes later there's this beautiful young lady sitting in the chair laughing and having a conversation and there's a twinkle in her eye. And I was sold. I was like,, this is what we're gonna go after cuz our product doesn't use needles. I think we could build a better mouse trap. And then also kind of the concept was we know there's an FDA path and we know there's a clinical path and we know the technical path. So the big three pillars of building a medical device company were relatively low risk.
And so we talked about it and then we formed the company and we spent the next three months trying to kill it. " Does this make sense? Do we really want to do this?" And just every time we turn around, another door opened. Another opportunity presented itself. A clinical partner came online, somebody came to us and we just were continually encouraged to keep persevering. And we developed our first generation device, put it in clinical trials in Austin, Texas at Recovery Unplugged. Everything from building the quality management system to building the product-- everything we were doing for the first time. But you know we persevered through that. Everything took twice as much money and twice as long as we expected. All along the way, everything continues to take twice as long and twice as much money, at least.
And then when we finished, we took the product to the FDA. And then that's when the real challenges began. We did a pre-submission. So you go to the FDA ahead of time and you go, "we think this is all the things we should do, and if we do 'em, you'll approve the product." And the FDA then gives you feedback and you take that feedback and then you go execute. And when we showed back up at the FDA, they said no, "we changed our mind." And we're, just like we're outta money we're, betting on this working. We did everything right. We followed the directions. So we started throwing money at consultants and onboarding people, and we onboarded somebody who, as a consultant, had just come out of the neuro division to help us fight, and finally got the product approved six months later than it should have.
But that was an exciting day. Well, it wasn't a day, it was a night. The FDA has a clock and they have to deliver all their documents and their decisions and everything before the timer runs out. And the timer ran out Saturday night at 11 o'clock, January the 2nd. So a holiday weekend, and we got the approval about 30 minutes before the clock ran out, which means on a holiday weekend, in the evening, people at the FDA were having to route this thing around and, and sign off on documents. I was like, "thanks, guys."
Lindsey Dinneen: Oh my word. But what a brilliant way to start the new year?
Daniel Powell: Yes, it was, and that was two years ago. And we spent the first year really trying to test different business models. Well, really spent both the first and second year just figuring out the business model. And all of us, our entire careers we'd sold into doctors and neurologists and neurosurgeons and hospital systems. And selling into addiction rehabilitation is a very different animal. It's funny cuz I would have a neurosurgeon when I was doing deep brain stimulation with St. Jude Medical, " where's all your clinical evidence? I wanna see four or five, six papers" and "where's your proof?" And then we went into addiction, everybody was like, "yeah, I totally believe you, this works." We're like, "okay, well we do have clinical proof also," but they would hit the "I believe" button really quick.
But integrating it into the practice has been a real challenge. And it didn't help that we started selling right in the middle of Covid, so we couldn't get appointments. But importantly, what we saw in rehab was, rehab is a tough business and doesn't pay great. They run on rough margins, and in the middle of Covid, a nurse could work at a rehab facility or get a job at a hospital and make four or five times the hourly rate. So that they had staff turnover. So it's, it was a real tough time to launch a product into the rehabilitation space.
Our journey has brought us to now where we have our second generation product about to be approved by the FDA. Really just took all the lessons on usability, accessibility. Everything we saw with the first gen, and we really did have like kind of an MVP, a minimally viable product. So we took all of our lessons to really make a very much more consumer focused, industrial design on the case and everything, and then get our costs of the goods way down as we get ready to ramp. And we're really focused on bringing this to telehealth and so our journey from here, at the time of recording this with you, is Covid changed everything.
If I had a business model in 2019 that said "I'm going to deliver at-home detox services with telehealth support," it would've been ridiculous. And then two years later, it's "of course that's the way you're gonna do it." It's changed all the laws, changed reimbursement, changed acceptance. It really is a great opportunity to meet people where they want to detox. Nobody really wants to go into a center and be away from their family and the comforts of life and their dog and the pet and the kids for seven days. And for some people that's the best thing for them to do. But for a lot of other people, they want to get well-- and we can dig into the opioid epidemic and the realities of it as opposed to maybe what a lot of people's preconceptions are-- but most people really want to get off their dependence or addiction to opioids. But going through the detox process is the giant barrier. You're gonna go through seven days of absolute hell. And so being able to let people stay at home through that process, we think, is really the way to go for the future here. So we're betting a lot on it.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. Well, there's a lot to unpack in that story. That is such a great story. Thank you for sharing that. So one thing that stands out, for sure, is you were saying that there is quite a bit of stigma around addiction and treatment. How do we get past that? How are you and Spark and the different products, how can that help alleviate some of the challenges with getting healthy again and overcoming that addiction?
Daniel Powell: Yeah, we definitely as a company want to actually not just alleviate withdrawal-- that's a minor piece-- but really be a solution for battling the opioid epidemic. So, the first step is to remove the stigma, stigmatization about it. At the RX Summit-- which is a big summit that has a lot of political leaders and industry leaders and pharmaceutical companies and everything that come together every year-- they put doctor's notes of patients with diabetes and then patients who had an assumed opioid overdose incident. And while the notes side by side were factually accurate, the tone of dismissal was just evident, you know, one was a bad patient and one was as patient you could have sympathy for. And it was really shocking to see that bias. I've heard the stories where the paramedics will use an extra large gauge needle to administer IV fluids on an overdose patient just so they hurt in the morning, just so that arm really hurts. And it's just, oh my gosh, you kind of back up and you go, "how inhumane? How inhumane is that?"
And so best I could do is I'll get on a podcasts like this and talk about it openly, but you know, in my own family, my nephew was addicted to heroin, this is my brother's kid. And I have permission to talk about it. In fact, now that he is in recovery, he talks about it all the time. So he said, absolutely I could reference him. And we didn't talk about it and he went to prison and I didn't ask about him and it was shameful, and my brother didn't want to talk about it and his wife didn't want to talk about it, because there's this failing of one of their children. And when I started this company, I actually called my brother one day and I said, how much had treatment cost him. Cause I was trying to get an idea of what to price this product at and would he buy it, and he had spent well over six figures.
And you realize families trying to save their loved ones were spending huge amounts of money and we just started talking and really formed a much closer bond and got really honest about everything. And it has brought us so much closer because there's no judgment. We're just really supportive of each other. And so from what I saw in my family is talking about it, hitting it head on, being honest and not throwing the person away is so important. And an opioid addiction-- we'll just talk about opioids-- opioids hijack the reward system in the brain so powerfully that you are not just being a bad actor, misbehaving, or just getting high. In my nephew's own words were, after six months or so, he never got high from heroin again. He was just running from withdrawal every four to six hours.
And then withdrawal is a complete fight or flight state of mind where you think you literally believe you're gonna die. And if I put you in a state of absolute fear and terror, and you believe your life is imminently gonna end, at the core of your being deep in the neurochemical structure of your brain, what are you gonna do? "I'm gonna have more willpower and I'm not gonna take these opioids." No, you're gonna do whatever it takes to make that go away and we're wired like that. So the more I've started to understand the neurochemical aspect of opioid addiction, and this translates to other addictions, but I specify this cuz this is what we have clearance for with the FDA. You go, "well, how important it is to remove that giant scary fight or flight, deep in the lizard brain part of our body, that primordial fear, to get somebody on a road to recovery." It's huge. It is the most important way to get them out of addiction. And so it's been really cool learning about this and really seeing how important this is to the journey of recovery.
Lindsey Dinneen: Absolutely. And is there any one story in particular-- I'm sure there are many-- but during these clinical trials, have certain stories emerged that are really particularly compelling to you as to how this device is making a difference in someone's life?
Daniel Powell: Yeah, there's a bunch. We always share stories of patients and all on our company chat. And I think someone always says, "I'm not crying. You're crying." So, I think that should be our company motto. We're adapting this for newborn babies too, so you wanna get everybody choked up, just go down that path. But I have two. One was, just a gentleman who has PTSD-- and we're not on label for PTSD, but PTSD was one of our secondary outcomes-- but PTSD is a constant state of fight or flight, which is what we're neuro modulating in the brain. But, he said, "I slept for the first time last night. I've never felt this peaceful in 10 years."
So that, that was one, but the other one was in our initial clinical trial and a young lady named Eliza had really fought addiction for years, had been in and out of rehab and came in, her dad made her go back in, I think she's 21, 22. And in her words, she was mad. She didn't wanna be there. She was gonna detox and then get the hell out of there and never come back like she was done. She didn't wanna get better. She just wanted to get through detox, which just meant she would've relapsed two days later after getting out. And about two, three days into the process to the five day process of her detoxing, she recognized she was clearheaded, feeling like her old self cuz she wasn't on any meds. She wasn't on meds to taper off the opioid. She was on our system and she made a life altering decision right there to continue therapy, which she vocally swore she wasn't gonna do. They put her in a 30 day program post detox. Then she went on and I've heard back from her and the family. A year later she went into a sober living facility and had reached over a year sober.
And her video and her story's on our website and you can watch it and I dare you not to tear up at the end. So the facility called us during the clinical trial and said, "this girl wants to do a testimonial." And so we piled in the camera equipment and drove from Houston to Austin as fast as possible and found a little room in the rehab facility, got some lighting up and just shot it on the spot. So it's not produced, it's just raw, and you just see the way she's beaming at how happy she was where she was in her life. And that was just on day five or six, that's before she went into long-term recovery. And we get those stories all the time. It's really exciting.
Lindsey Dinneen: That is amazing. The impact that makes on not just the individual who, of course, their life is dramatically changed as a result, but all of the people who love them. Oh my goodness. I am sure that it's extremely hard on the family and loved ones as well because they're watching somebody in a difficult place. And so, oh my gosh, just the ripple effects of what y'all do is really amazing.
Daniel Powell: Well, thank you, it's funny you said that. I was talking to somebody else yesterday and he goes, "have you thought of the legacy you're leaving?" He goes, "you're creating a legacy. They think of the families they're affecting and then the children that's gonna pass onto." And it, it got real humbling, real quick. I'm just fighting the FDA today for a second gen product and making sure our third party logistics is shipping. Stop and pull back and remember that we have a great culture here at Spark. Everybody knows they're part of something really important and come to work with that passion to make a difference in people's lives.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, absolutely. Well, I know that you've had experience with other companies and then of course with your own, but is there any particular moment that stands out to you because it kind of clearly confirmed that the medtech industry was the right one for you?
Daniel Powell: Yeah, for sure. When I was at St. Jude Medical doing spinal cord stim and I got to go on a field ride and then talk to, I remember this old man had spinal cord stim, and he was in a follow-up visit and I was getting to do a ride along with the sales rep. And the man said, " a year ago, I I couldn't even get out of the chair without assistance and today I climbed a ladder" cuz of the pain relief he had from spinal cord stim. And just hearing those stories and this person telling you "this product made a difference in my life." But it then got really profound for me when I went to deep brain stimulation.
And so I had the privilege of being on the launch team for St. Jude's deep brain stimulation platform in Europe. And with deep brain stimulation, the patient is put under kind of twilight anesthesia, holes drilled in the head, wires put in the brain, but then you wake them back up and have them do motor tests cuz you're taking this little wire and you're pushing it into a 3D space. The brain's like a bowl of jello. So imagine you're pushing a wire into Jello shooting for 3D space that you can't see, the size of a pea. And so to make sure you're on target, you wake the patient up and have them like draw a circle or sign their name. And that whole experience when you're working with the physicians to actively use the product and being a subject matter expert during the surgeries in the early days. It was the most amazing thing to be in the brain surgery,. And then having the patient cry cuz they, their hands have been shaking so much, they haven't been able to sign their name in a decade and here they are able to sign their name while their brain's exposed and their skull's open. It's just, it was just such I, I look around, I'm like, "how did I get here? This is a amazing." So I have a special place in my heart for anything deep brain stimulation. That, that was truly just an amazing part of my career.
Lindsey Dinneen: Oh my goodness. So now you've come from a business background and so has that really helped your entrepreneurial journey and is that something that you felt like it did help prepare you for this particular company or is this a lot of learning on the way as well?
Daniel Powell: Yeah, no, that business background didn't do anything for me with the game store. So, clear, clearly, clearly, no. So what happened after the game stores and I went to work for St. Jude and then onto Cyberonics down in Houston, which is now LivaNova that does vagus nerve stim in the neck for epilepsy and depression is, I actually learned the business. We went through a warning letter, so I learned all about quality. We went through FDA submissions that I was part of the meetings and audits. And I spent the next 15 years actually learning a skillset in an industry versus meandering my way so that when the opportunity came to start my own company, I kind of looked around. I was like, "oh, I know what to do."
And what it was is respecting everything besides the business portion. So respecting that a quality system's important and you need a quality manager. And respecting that you need IP and respecting the engineering process has to happen and it's takes longer and it's messy. You're respecting that the legal stuff needs to be made, respecting and appreciating all that goes into running a clinical trial. And I say all that because I've been part of a company where the CEO just yelled at everybody to "get it done," but didn't really know what it took to get it done. And so I think that's what prepared me more was understanding and respecting all the various parts of the business. I don't have to totally understand it, but I have to be aware of its level of difficulty and the talent it takes to execute it properly. And I think that's really served to be successful.
The other opportunity that presented Spark uniquely is my two co-founders with me. Alejandro has his PhD in neuroengineering and he's our CTO and he is an absolute expert in that domain. And so we got the technicals covered by him. We got the business covered by me. And then Navid Khodaparast has his PhD in neurophysiology and is our chief science officer. And so when it comes to the clinical studies and the science and everything, while there's some overlap with him and Alejandro, he comprehensively covers the science. So we got engineering covered and patents, science and grants covered with Navid. And then the business side and sales and marketing covered with me. And it created a wonderful balance where we didn't have three scientists or three engineers, or three business guys stepping on each other, but three very complementary skill sets that we all brought to the table. And if somebody's starting a company, I would say " find partners that fill out other skill sets you're never gonna be able to master."
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. That's great advice. Surround yourself with good people that are complementary in their abilities and their knowledge. How do you personally prioritize your continued growth and learning as a leader?
Daniel Powell: Hmm, that's an interesting question. Ooh, I'll look back to the first time I was a manager and I've come a long ways. I, I think a couple things have affected that is there was a point in time where you realized that supporting your team and enabling their success versus controlling them. And I don't know where I've started seeing that. I remember specifically as a, a director at Cyberonics and we could get in front of the board room and I started reading books more on being a manager. There's something that tripped the realization that I needed to enhance that skillset. There's like a book, like the first 90 days or something like that when you're a new manager and you outline a plan, and so I, I embarked upon that. And I was moving down to Houston, joining this department. And I just really got real serious about not just meandering down and doing it, but really having a very specific plan.
And so I started to educate myself more and more, read books on leadership and think about it. And I made this change from needing to be seen and get the kudos. And it just dawned on me: if the people working for me, if I just said" it was because of them," I got all the credit, but then they got all the credit too. And you had a loyal team and they felt appreciated. So you could see a manager, a director gets into the boardroom and gets to present and shows everybody what he did when reality is his team did it behind him as opposed to a director or VP or that they'd have an opportunity to present to upper management. And when they go, "well, that's really good," you say, "ah, that was John. I couldn't have done it without him. This was all his research." "Oh, that was, Jane. She pulled this together, amazing talent on my team."
And once you flip over and start understanding that managing gets really easy. You start to be able to cultivate loyal teams. I had a manager tell me, he sent me an article. The article was, "Is Your Manager for You, for Themselves, or Against You?" And it said, "you know, managers look at their employees three ways." One is the majority of 'em are for themselves. Look, "I'll throw you under the bus if I have to to move my career forward. But otherwise I have no Ill intent towards you, but you know, this is about me." That's the majority of managers. On a rare occasion you get managers who are for you, they're like, "I want to make you succeed. I'm confident in where I am. If you move in front of me, it won't even hurt my feelings, but I'm invested in you." I had a manager at St. Jude like that, and he was fantastic and really was that example.
On the rare occasion you get somebody who's against you and they want you to fail. I also got that manager at a later point in time. And in the article and the wisdom said, "you run, leave the company. There is no surviving that and it's toxic and I'll tear you down." So I try to really be for my people's success. And then I think moving into the CEO role and starting the company really put the pressure on me. And then life had changed from books to this thing called YouTube. I could watch and so I just gobbled up videos by Simon Sinek and real thought leaders on, on how to lead and all these great voices that are out there. And we really try to adopt those styles of management and those philosophies into Spark. We spent a lot of time talking about culture and how we were gonna build a really good company that, that was great to work at in the early days.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. That's great. And then that's great advice too in general for a leader or an aspiring leader. Appreciate your people, support your people, and it changes everything. As an employee, you feel appreciated and feel valued and feel like your contribution makes a difference, so, that's great advice. I like it. Well, on a lighter note, perhaps, imagine someone were to offer you a million dollars to teach a masterclass on anything you want, does not have to be in your industry. What would you choose to teach and why?
Daniel Powell: I like mentoring. I would love to teach, end to end, how do you bring a medical device to market. And, I think what I've done over the last four years, personally, my personal growth everywhere from raising money and the management of all these different processes. I love sharing that. I love being a resource to other, younger entrepreneurs on this journey, on that kind of stuff. So it would still be in this industry, I think, and I think it would reflect what I've learned and experienced and then been successful doing over the last four years.
Lindsey Dinneen: Excellent. Well, we definitely need a masterclass on that. That would be a great topic.
Daniel Powell: But I don't have the discipline to put a curriculum together. I'm telling you now. The question hurt, cuz in my mind I was like, "I don't have energy for that."
Lindsey Dinneen: That is fair, but also you are currently a little busy with your own company. So maybe this could be your retirement gig or something just for fun.
Daniel Powell: I'm a procrastinator and I wing stuff and I wouldn't prepare ahead of time. I would just say, I would just wing it.
Lindsey Dinneen: Ok. Ok.
Daniel Powell: It's horrible to say. I know.
Lindsey Dinneen: Okay. Well, we touched on legacy earlier, but I am curious, what is the one thing that you would wish to be remembered for after you leave this world?
Daniel Powell: I really hope what we're doing here, just two things. I hope the people I work with have good lives and got to go to work and not felt like somebody was against them. You see you're in these companies and the layoffs come and people get treated like numbers and we have had to have a layoff and there were people who were like, "this is not working for the business." But we try to be as humane and caring as possible when we're making tough decisions. So I'd like for the people who work for Spark, I hope this is an enriching part of their life, and that it allowed them to have a better family life. I mean, I just remember the stress of working for a company that's going through layoff after layoff, and you see bad managers treating people poorly and you sometimes get trapped there and you got nowhere to go. So I hope on one note for internally that I've made everybody who's part of this journey, their life better. And then I hope that we've really are gonna put some products into the world that, that had a legacy effect that saved families and brought 'em together. It's cool getting to work in medtech, right? We're not just making a widget, but this widget has real effects on lives. I'm lucky I get to work in this industry. It's really cool.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, absolutely agree. Yeah. Well, and my final question is what is one thing that makes you smile every time you see or think about it?
Daniel Powell: I think our work in the neonatal space is just the most rewarding thing in the world. So these newborn babies born physically dependent on opioids. And that gets me up early every single day and keeps me motivated. We're not on market with the baby product yet, but we're in our big clinical trial and it's just cool. I always smile when I just even think the serendipity of how this happened. So I was on a flight to San Francisco to go to the Neurotech Reports conference, and I was putting my first investor PowerPoint together. And so I've got internet connection and I'm looking up, " how many people die of opioids and how many Americans are addicted" and putting all the numbers together.
And I come across neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome and I start to read about it and how these babies are born and they just go through a horrible, excruciating first month of life. And, They had this like unnatural scream or cry and they don't feed, and I was like," oh my gosh. We have to do something about this." And so I sent an email to Navid and Alejandro and I'm like, "look at this article. We are gonna do this too, even if we don't make money." And by the time I landed, they both had replied, "we're all in." Like on that day we started the neonatal program and started researching.
The next day I went to the first session and the first panel was New Science Discoveries. And about the second presenter was Dr. Bashar Badran out of MUSC. And he was presenting his auricular vagus nerve stimulation results on newborn babies for stroke recovery for feeding. So in front of me was the only person in the world who had ever stimulated a baby's ear and had brand new breaking results. And I mean, I was " what are the chances 24 hours after we see this?" So he, he finished speech and got off the stage and I ran up like a crazy man and I'm like, "we're gonna work together" and he was like, like, "wow." I was just, it was just I and I--
Lindsey Dinneen: Wow.
Daniel Powell: My, my wife said several times "the universe conspires to make us successful." I think what we're doing is good and is noble. And things like that, I mean, and so it took him over two or three years to get his IRB approval to run his first baby study. We piggybacked on their IRB approval and had approval in 60 days. So I mean like probably shaved two years off getting this product to market. It's really amazing. So that makes all, that makes me smile every time.
Lindsey Dinneen: Oh yeah. And that's a fantastic story. Oh my goodness. Thank you for sharing that. Well, thank you, Daniel, so, so very much for joining me today. Thank you for all of your insights and your stories. I'm so inspired by what your company is doing, how it's helping-- just again, the ripple effects. I keep thinking about that and that's just that's really amazing. So, so thank you for what you all are doing to help change lives.
And we are honored to be making a donation on your behalf as a thank you for your time today to Threads of Love, which through the effort and support of many participants and chapters across the country, provides clothing, blankets, and other handmade articles for tiny, premature and sick infants.
And I just think, Daniel, that works so well with exactly what you were just talking about and your heart for others. So thank you for choosing that organization to support. Thank you again for your time. I just wish you continued success as you work to change lives for a better world.
Daniel Powell: Thank you so much. I appreciate the chance to tell the story.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, absolutely. And thank you also to our listeners for tuning in and if you are feeling as inspired as I am right now, I would love if you would share this episode with a colleague or two and we will catch you next time.
 The Leading Difference podcast is brought to you by Velentium.
Velentium is a contract design and manufacturing firm specializing in the development, production and post-market support of diagnostic and therapeutic active medical devices, including implantables and wearables for neuromodulation and other class three indications.
Velentium's core competencies include electrical design, mechanical design, embedded software, mobile apps, contract manufacturing, embedded cybersecurity, OT cybersecurity, systems engineering, human factors and usability, and automated test systems.
Velentium works with clients worldwide from startups seeking seed funding to established Fortune 100 companies.
Visit velentium.com to explore your next step in medical device development.

JoJo Platt | Platt & Associates | From Accounting to Neurotech, Leadership, & ”Good-Natured Revenge”

Our very first guest, JoJo Platt, is a longtime consultant serving the neurotech community through the commercialization process. In this episode, JoJo discusses her eclectic background, views on leadership, the future of neurotech, and how good-natured "revenge" is one of her primary motivators. 
Guest links: http://theplattassociates.com/ | https://www.joyventures.com/ | https://neurotechreports.com/ | https://skrapspodcast.com/ 
Charity supported: Polaris Project 
Interested in being a guest on the show or have feedback to share? Email us at podcast@velentium.com. 
PRODUCTION CREDITSHost: Lindsey DinneenEditor: Tim OliphantProducer: Velentium
 
SHOW TRANSCRIPTEpisode 002 - JoJo Platt
Lindsey Dinneen: Hi, I'm Lindsey with Velentium and I'm talking with MedTech industry leaders on how they change lives for a better world.
Diane Bouis: The inventions and technologies are fascinating and so are the people who work with them.
Frank Jaskulke: There was a period of time where I realized, fundamentally, my job was to go hang out with really smart people that are saving lives and then do work that would help them save more lives.
Diane Bouis: I got into the business to save lives and it is incredibly motivating to work with people who are in that same business, saving or improving lives.
Duane Mancini: What better industry than where I get to wake up every day and just save people's lives.
Lindsey Dinneen: These are extraordinary people doing extraordinary work, and this is The Leading Difference.
Hello and welcome to the Leading Difference Podcast. I'm your host, Lindsey, and I'm excited to introduce you to my guest today, Jojo Platt. Jojo is a longtime consultant serving the neurotech community through the commercialization process. She works with academic labs, neurotech startups, and others to advance neuro technologies into the hands of patients. Jojo is the US Partnership's lead for Joy Ventures. She works with Neurotech Reports, co-hosts the Skraps podcast, and serves on many organizing committees of the industry's most influential conferences and meetings. And I am so thrilled that she is joining me today. Welcome to the show, Jojo. Thanks for being here.
JoJo Platt: Thank you for having me on. I'm really excited to be on the other side of the mic this time.
Lindsey Dinneen: Oh yes, that's right. Please tell us a little bit about yourself and your background to get started, if you don't mind.
JoJo Platt: Sure. I work specifically in the field of neurotechnology that's even more narrow than medical devices.
I prefer to think of it as a different focus than just pure, broad speaking neuromodulation and I've been consulting to academic labs, startups, government offices, universities, kind of everybody in the neurotech space for about 15 years now, and a lot of people find it challenging to really fully understand what I do.
So I keep it broad because I do a lot of different things. I like to think about all of the scientists and technologists who have spent their entire lives honing and perfecting their science and technology skills. And I come in on the other side of that and help them on the business side. So if they're ready to translate, if they're thinking about creating a spin out, if they wanna optimize their research for future licensing and spin out, there are things that can be done even at the academic level that can make a big difference into how technology or therapy commercialized. And I do everything except for accounting and housekeeping.
Lindsey Dinneen: Amazing. So I am curious, do you mind delving a little bit more into how you help bridge the gap between a company or an individual who is looking to develop new technology? And what have you found is the most needed aspect of that sort of bridging the gap process or how do you feel that your consulting and your services are able to help these people? Because I know you're making a difference, but I'm curious as to what things you find are the most common, and where people can use that assistance from a different perspective?
JoJo Platt: The field overall, especially the commercialization side of the equation is still relatively young. I know, spinal cord stimulators coming out Tom Mortimer's lab and all of that in the sixties and some of the cardiac pacemaker technologies, those have been around for a long time. But when you get into some of the neural interfaces, be it in the central or peripheral nervous system, those are on the newer side.
So we still have a lot of technology founders or technical founders, or scientific founders, which is fantastic. There's nobody who knows the technology and the science better than these folks. But like I said before, they're classically trained on the science and technology side of things. So there are tons of resources out there that can help prepare them to be a CEO or a founding CEO. But they still need a lot of support and whether they find that they need help in making their business case as they're pitching for financing to VCs, helping them hone that pitch, whether it's in support of market research, helping them determine what's the best path to market sometimes. I primarily like to focus on FDA cleared or FDA approved devices and I definitely favor implanted devices over wearables, but there are definitely fantastic wearable technologies. That's all to say that direct to consumer is something I can appreciate and admire, but that's not an area of expertise for me. So I'll help them look at the regulatory pathways, reimbursement pathways. I either do that on my own or I also work very heavily with a team at Neurotech Reports, Jim Cavouto and Jeremy Koff, who both have excellent track records in Neurotech as well.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. That is wonderful. And so when you are helping these folks, these scientists-- I think we talked in a previous conversation about how sometimes the business aspect, like you said, you can learn a lot about how to be a CEO and there are certain things that maybe come a little bit easier than others, but in terms of, say the marketing side of things or how to translate the science into a more widely understood-- if you're going to explain it to your grandma kind of thing.
You have a really interesting background that didn't necessarily start in the science field. Do you mind exploring a little bit about how that helps you translate between the two?
JoJo Platt: Sure. I have a very long sort of meandering journey into a lot of different areas. I started out my first, I like to call it my first real job, my first office job was a one person of a two person accounting team at an internet backbone technology company. And that's to say, because this was in the mid to late nineties, it wasn't part of the dot com boom so much as it was, anytime you watch video on the internet, that call and response of the video packets that get delivered to you are still done even now, 25 years later on the internet backbone which is video delivery optimization.
So we were basically solving how to stream video on the internet when the internet was operating at basically a 14 4k speed. So accounting, I thought that's what I wanted to do. That was my degree program at the time, and I was in school and working and being a single mom and all that. And we went through an IPO, which was an amazing learning experience, but it was a lot of work.
I'd go to the office at six in the morning. Work till six at night. Go to class, go home, see my daughter, go back to work until about two o'clock in the morning and they go back at six and it burned me out. We were a startup and the hours were long, so, after the IPO I was processing some expense accounts and I kept seeing all of these marketing expense reports come in. I'm like, "you guys went to dinner where? You spent what? You did?" And I'm just like, "wait, let me get this straight: you're having this much fun and I'm sitting here behind a desk processing your expense reports." So I said, "this is over. I'm going over to marketing." And so I was still in school, so I changed my major and finished that up on the comm side of things.
I don't tend to refer to what I do now as marketing or communications. Because it's only a part of what I do, and also because those words tend to scare a lot of scientists. They don't believe in self-promotion. And they just find the marketing and communication side of things, PR and that sort of thing, quite unsavory. So I don't talk about it in those terms, but that is a little bit about what I do and especially, my own, I guess you'd call it a brand. I don't know that it's brand so much, but it just happened. So yeah, from accounting to marketing, I went through the dot com bubble in the early two thousands with the community site that was the early competitor to MySpace and earlier than Facebook even. So we raised a lot of money. The founders burned through all of it. That crashed. I decided at one point I was gonna kinda have an early retirement 'cause I had done well with my IPO and then got bored.
I've done consumer electronics, was working with a technology company trying to solve the whole Napster problem with copyright protection for music. And we were a finalist in the industry competition that was gonna lead to an industry standard of content protection. And then just a month or so before it was all finalized, iTunes came out with a 99 cents song, which between the lawsuit against Napster and an affordable easy, one click way to get music, that pretty well solved the problem for the most part. So that one went away.
 then from there I ended up, this one's a really strange one. From there I ended up going and working at a nonprofit that had, before my arrival, they had fallen afoul with the IRS and it wasn't-- the nonprofit needed some closer management. For the most part it was doing okay. It was doing what it was supposed to be doing. For, again, for the most part, its problem was that the founder was a person of interest in his other business dealings. So IRS and the Department of Justice figured they were gonna "Capone" this guy. Basically go after him and get him for anything that they could, whether it was directly related to the insurance schemes that he was running or if they could get him some other way. So I jumped in, became the court appointed trustee for the foundation and helped the DOJ and the IRS Criminal Investigations Division actually put this guy in jail. So that was kind of, it was a little scary at times. But it was fun. And at the end of the day, I got to help give away 47 million dollars to a lot of different charities.
And one of the things that we wanted to look at was sepsis research, because one of our board members, his daughter passed away very quickly and very unexpectedly from sepsis. So we wanted to support sepsis research. And found out that Kevin Tracy at the Feinstein Institute in New York was doing a lot of really exciting work in sepsis and I started helping them out on a consulting basis on some of the sepsis activities and then some Parkinson's research initiatives that they were working on. And as they were getting ready to launch the Center for Bioelectronic Medicine, they just kept pulling me on board for project after project and kept consulting on that helped them launch the center with some very good friends of mine. I'm glad to say it's still a very successful research entity and putting out amazing work. And we launched a journal by the same name. And part of my responsibilities there were to really understand and know the players in the field of neurotechnology and find out what they were working on and see if I couldn't help to facilitate collaborations, whether it was research or further down the road into the commercialization spectrum. And that's how I fell into neurotech. It's a very long, very circuitous, bumpy road.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yes. But it's an amazing backstory and it has led you to a whole new chapter really, and new opportunities that you probably couldn't have imagined when you first were even in school. Thinking ahead, what's my life gonna look like? So that's...
JoJo Platt: I'm still waiting to find out what it is I'm gonna do.
Lindsey Dinneen: That's amazing. Yeah. Well, I'm curious, is there a particular moment that stands out to you because it clearly confirmed that this chapter was the right next step for you? I know you had mentioned the importance of working on the sepsis research and supporting that initiative and things like that. Obviously that was something that was important to you, but I'm curious, as you've continued along this path, is there just something that stands out where you thought, "yes, this is the right next chapter for me" and why?
JoJo Platt: I don't think there was a single moment. I think somebody asked me a similar question at a conference earlier, I guess last fall, and, "Why are you doing this?" And, "What got you involved or what keeps you here?" And I think part of it is still really true. That part of it is revenge. Don't get me wrong, I went to a very excellent high school, but my science teachers saw in me a very, very strong lack of scientific ability. I didn't apply myself in my science classes and they all begged me never to take a science class again-- just get through this one and don't take any more science than is required. So I think the part that keeps me here most is that I'm not a scientist and I'm not a technologist. I've definitely learned a lot from everyone that I've had the good fortune of working with or seeing some of the amazing talks that I've seen over the last 15 years. But I can have an impact and not be a scientist or a technologist. And I think that inspiration keeps me going.
And I'll be on stage with some of the world's most important neurotechnologists, and I always make sure and take a picture and then send it back to my science teachers and say, "See, I did okay".
Lindsey Dinneen: I love it.
JoJo Platt: Yeah. There might be a little spite there, but just, all good fun.
Lindsey Dinneen: Good natured.
JoJo Platt: Yes. Yes.
Lindsey Dinneen: That is seriously amazing. I definitely have a little bit-- I'll put it this way-- I have enough rebel in me where if someone says that I can't do something, then I have to prove them wrong.
JoJo Platt: Right.
Lindsey Dinneen: It's just -- we're gonna figure out how to do this, might not come easily, but we'll figure it out.
JoJo Platt: Yeah. And I don't think I would've gone out of my way to do that had I not stumbled into this field, but the fact that I'm here now, I'll leverage that a little bit.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. Yeah. Amazing. Well, how would you define leadership? Or what does leadership mean to you?
JoJo Platt: To me leadership is not so much telling people what to do, but making sure that your team is inspired to follow you. And I think that difference is one thing that's really important between a boss and a leader. Also why I don't have employees. I think that bringing on the right team members for the right problems and empowering them to do their jobs is probably, a pretty inspiring leadership principle. And the people who have that gift are people toward whom I gravitate, just sort of in, in my own personal fandom of that capacity. And when I see that I like to highlight that and foster that. But I think I know my own weaknesses, which are anything in the area where HR would have jurisdiction, I'm the worst nightmare. And I love being a collaborator, but being a leader is a gift that I think I'll let others take the helm for that one.
Lindsey Dinneen: Oh, that is fair. I appreciate that perspective. Well, what is your best piece of advice for someone interested in obtaining either a leadership role within the med tech industry, or since you talked about being in more of a collaboration role or a collaborator role, what is your best piece of advice if someone's looking to do something similar to what you do in helping bridge this gap in helping assist these amazing people bring their ideas to reality?
JoJo Platt: I think one of the greatest parts about the neurotech field is that we're still young enough that there are opportunities everywhere, and I know we're going into a bit of a shrinking right-sizing economic exercise, and that some of that will include some painful moments for a lot of people. But I think from my experience, it's better to correct than to crash. So I'm optimistic about where we are in that, and I think that we are truly at the point in the field where there's a legitimate reason to say, if your dream job in neurotechnology doesn't exist, go and create it. And I think this space is open to so many different areas of expertise. So we need people in finance and business management, administration, operations, systems management. And yes, marketing is actually starting to become a legitimate and respected division of a lot of different companies. So that's good to see. But you can really come from any field and contribute to neurotechnology. And one of the things that I see a lot are people who have a hybrid blend of expertise. So they might be neuroscientists by training who went through an MBA program or an MBA candidate who has strong engineering background.
Those are the kinds of cross talented people that we're really gonna need. And I think we are seeing a lot more interest from the sort of traditional business categories of contributors to the point of we need more qualified CEOs in our field, and we need more people in finance that really understand what the technology implications are.
A lot of my clients really are focused on and need regulatory and reimbursement experts. There's a need for people who have organizing backgrounds. For instance, next week in DC, Paradromics has been instrumental in putting together our BCI days going to talk on Capitol Hill about export controls on brain computer interfaces so that sort of organization and lobby expertise. So I think that if you have a passion in terms of what it is you want to do and you want to apply it to the field of neurotechnology, there are so many opportunities that didn't even exist even 24 months ago. So I think we're growing quickly and it's exciting to bring new people into the field and help accelerate and propel these fascinating and really potentially hugely impactful technologies.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. What do you see as being some of the most exciting trends in this field moving forward?
JoJo Platt: Well, brain computer interface is definitely one. There are some really great players in the field. BlackRock Neurotech has been the leader in the field and out of the, I think we're-- I think we're right around 40 or 40 plus humans who have been implanted with brain computer interfaces. And well over 30 of those people have BlackRock technology implanted. But we're seeing some really great newcomers with novel ideas, novel technologies. Paradromics, who I previously mentioned, is one and Synchron has been getting a lot of attention for their vascular approach to a BCI.
Precision Neuroscience just closed a big round last week. And Motif Neurotech is exciting. That's a new technology out of Rice and it's a minimally invasive brain computer interface. And their first indication is major depressive disorder. Inner Cosmos is going after the same indication with their minimally invasive approach. They're both exciting to watch. And I think BCI obviously gets so much more attention because of Elon Musk's involvement in the field.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. Well, I am excited to also continue to learn about the new developments coming up. It is a crazy time. I joke about this a lot, " what a time to be alive." But seriously, it is so exciting to see what's coming up, what's possible these days just is amazing. It's mind blowing. So thank you for sharing some of your insights with that.
JoJo Platt: My pleasure. It's a fine line. You wanna talk about the potential, but you also have to be reasonable in managing expectations, especially with a patient population that needs the therapy. Promising and underdelivering is something that everybody is very focused on maintaining that integrity.
There was a talk couple weeks ago where the CFO of BlackRock Neurotech said, "we like to focus on the "art of the possible" and being sure that we're not over representing what is today possible and what will may eventually become possible." And I like that. That to me, is very responsible communications.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, absolutely. So I'm curious, how do you prioritize your continued learning and growing as a leader, as someone of influence within your industry. How do you prioritize your continued growth?
JoJo Platt: I've just been so lucky to meet and engage with so many really exciting researchers, whether they're on the science or technology side. And I'm at the point where a lot of what comes in front of me, people will send to me directly and they're like, "Hey, Jojo, this just came out." Or, "this is a publication that's coming out next week. Let's see if we can amplify it." So a lot of my sort of choices are spoon fed to me. And then that sends me down a rabbit hole. I mean, there's so much to discover. Anywhere you look it's out there. So I should be more strategic about it. If you have something that you think is really important that you think the community wants to know about, I do invite people to send it to me. And if I have a chance to amplify it and call attention to it in any small way, then I'm grateful for that opportunity. It helps me see different things that I might not otherwise.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. Well, and that's a great segue into, I'd love to learn a little bit about your podcast. Is that one of the tools that you use to amplify some of those things? Or is that completely separate?
JoJo Platt: It's a little bit of both, so. Okay. The podcast is scraps with a "K," S-K-R-A-P-S, and that's because a lot of scientific exploration and inspiration comes at the bar talking to your colleagues and you write your idea on the back of a scrap of piece of paper. And the other reason it's called Skraps is cuz it's "spark" spelled backwards. Anyhow, my co-host for that is Arun Sridhar and he's the former head of Discovery at Galvani Bioelectronics. So he brings the scientific rigor to the podcast and I'm the cheeky monkey who gets to be a little sillier. But we've done a little bit of everything. It is a hobby for us and we like to highlight people that have inspired us in different ways. But we also are sure to try and make it fun.
So we've done everything from human composting. Shortly after Covid hit, we had the graphic artist who did the rendering of the Covid molecule, the gray ball with the spikes that is everywhere, which was a fascinating story. She literally got woken up outta bed in the middle of the night in January 2020 and they said, "We've got something, you've gotta come down here and draw this for us." So that's an interesting thing. Okay? So I'm like, "You wanna just put me on speed dial next time you get one of those calls and tell me about it?" But we've done everything. They're incredible leaders in, in science and research.
On the show we did a 10 part series on psychedelics in research. That was about a year and a half ago now. So that was at the vanguard of the psychedelic research revolution. So we did a pretty comprehensive history back to early human use all the way through the obvious fifties, sixties, seventies with MK Ultra and then what's happening in research today and how some of the people who are benefiting from psychedelics and psychedelic therapy.
And then now we're in the middle of a series on the vagus nerve in neurotechnology. So we just do a little bit of everything, whether it's a topic or a person or a personality. We try and keep it fun.
Lindsey Dinneen: I love that. That's awesome. Okay, well, for fun, imagine someone offered you a million dollars to teach a masterclass on anything you want-- doesn't have to even be in your industry. What would you choose to teach and why?
JoJo Platt: Oh, that's a good one. I don't know that I would be qualified for that. I've always thought of myself more of a jack of all trades, master of none . I'm a boy scout. I'm prepared for anything, but I'm maybe not the master at any one thing. And I think that's what I love about so many of the people that I encounter, is that they've dedicated their whole educational career, their professional career to one particular thing and they can teach the master classes and I'll sit back and watch and then post about it.
Lindsey Dinneen: What a fun answer. Okay. Well, do you think you could then teach a masterclass on how to be prepared for anything because you never know what will come your way?
JoJo Platt: I do have my shortcuts, like when I really get in over my head with a neuroscientist, I can start talking about engineering, and same thing if I get in over my head in an engineering conversation, I'll switch over to neuroscience or something. And if I get really flustered, I'll just say "The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell!" and walk away.
Lindsey Dinneen: Brilliant.
JoJo Platt: So yeah, you always wanna have a couple catchphrases that'll get you into or out of any conversation.
Lindsey Dinneen: All right. I like it. Yeah. I need to develop a few more of those, I think. What is the one thing you wish to be remembered for after you leave this world?
JoJo Platt: I hope that when I'm gone that the people that I've known and had the privilege of being associated with, either professionally or personally, oftentimes both-- that they always knew that I was there if they needed help or if there was some way that I could contribute to their success, that would be the greatest highlight of my day. I'm not the one doing the hard stuff, so I'm here to help the people who are, and if that's how I'm remembered, I wouldn't hate that.
Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. I love that. Well, final question. What's one thing that makes you smile every time you see or think about it?
JoJo Platt: But one of the things that, I find wonderful, full of wonder, fill me with wonder, are really the pieces of science that you don't realize, or mathematics or engineering that are all around you all the time, and if you know where to look or how to find them, you start to see. I have a fascination with Fibonaccis. So if you start to read and learn about the Fibonacci Sequence and how it's applied and where it's found in nature, where it applies in mathematics, how it affects what we view as aesthetically pleasing-- there's "The Great Wave of Kanagawa," which is a Fibonacci Sequence. It's an old Japanese block print that is perfectly aligned with the Fibonacci spiral. So things like that. Things that blur the line between mathematics and science and beauty. I think that's pretty inspiring. That makes me smile.
Lindsey Dinneen: Oh, I love that. That's beautiful. Well, I just wanted to say thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for sharing about your background and all the fascinating things that you have done that have led you to where you are right now. And who knows what you're gonna do in the future, but it is so fun to hear about it. So thank you for being so open sharing all those wonderful things. And we are honored to be making a donation on your behalf as a thank you for your time today. It's going to Polaris Project, which was Jojo's choice, and that is a non-governmental organization that works to combat and prevent sex and labor trafficking in North America. So thank you for that, Jojo. Thank you so much again for your time. We wish you just the most continued success as you work to change lives for a better world.
JoJo Platt: Thank you. Thanks for having me on. I really appreciate it.
Lindsey Dinneen: Of course. And thank you also to our listeners for tuning in, and if you're feeling as inspired as I am right now, I'd love it if you'd share this episode with a colleague or two, and we will catch you next time.
 The Leading Difference podcast is brought to you by Velentium.
Velentium is a contract design and manufacturing firm specializing in the development, production and post-market support of diagnostic and therapeutic active medical devices, including implantables and wearables for neuromodulation and other class three indications.
Velentium's core competencies include electrical design, mechanical design, embedded software, mobile apps, contract manufacturing, embedded cybersecurity, OT cybersecurity, systems engineering, human factors and usability, and automated test systems.
Velentium works with clients worldwide from startups seeking seed funding to established Fortune 100 companies.
Visit velentium.com to explore your next step in medical device development.

Introduction to The Leading Difference Podcast

This debut episode introduces The Leading Difference podcast, sharing its mission and purpose, along with logistics for format, frequency, and who you'll be hearing as featured guests.
Interested in being a guest on the show or have feedback to share? Email us at podcast@velentium.com. 
 
HOST: Lindsey DinneenEDITOR: Tim OliphantPRODUCER: Velentium 
SHOW NOTESEpisode 001 - Introduction to The Leading Difference
Lindsey Dinneen: Hi, I'm Lindsey with Velentium and I'm talking with MedTech industry leaders on how they change lives for a better world.
Diane Bouis: The inventions and technologies are fascinating and so are the people who work with them.
Frank Jaskulke: There was a period of time where I realized, fundamentally, my job was to go hang out with really smart people that are saving lives and then do work that would help them save more lives.
Diane Bouis: I got into the business to save lives and it is incredibly motivating to work with people who are in that same business, saving or improving lives.
Duane Mancini: What better industry than where I get to wake up every day and just save people's lives.
Lindsey Dinneen: These are extraordinary people doing extraordinary work, and this is The Leading Difference.
Lindsey Dinneen: Hello and welcome to the very first episode of The Leading Difference. My name is Lindsey Dinneen, and I will be your podcast host, happily interviewing leaders in the MedTech industry who are changing lives for a better world.
I'm excited to be bringing a differently angled podcast to the MedTech space. I'm interviewing extraordinary people to learn about who they are as people. What is their background? How did they get to where they are, and where do they plan to go from here? Most importantly, I want to know what attracted them to the MedTech industry specifically.
I love hearing a wide variety of stories, conventional and unconventional, from an assortment of diverse perspectives. These people are making a profound difference, and I'm excited to learn why and how.
As an outsider who came into the MedTech industry just two years ago, I was vaguely aware of an unjust stigma hovering over the industry: that of the folks who worked in it being primarily financially driven in their motivation to innovate. However, I have found that to be a pretty unfair assumption. I am so grateful to have gotten to meet some of the coolest, smartest, most respectful, curious, humble, and innovative people I've ever met in this industry. And their "why" stories are incredibly compelling. They're in this industry to make a living, of course, but much more importantly, they're here to make a difference. These are the stories I wanna share with the world.
Here are the details of what to expect from The Leading Difference. You'll hear a wide variety of voices. I'm especially passionate about elevating people who don't always get to share their stories. The episodes will generally last about 30 minutes. We'll be releasing new episodes every two weeks on Fridays for a way to end your work week on a positive and inspiring note. You'll hear from CEOs, engineers, scientists, researchers, and more. If you ever wanted to get to know some of your favorite medtech leaders on a more personal level, now's your chance.
I invite you to join me on this journey to discover what makes The Leading Difference.
Lindsey Dinneen: The Leading Difference podcast is brought to you by Velentium.
Velentium is a contract design and manufacturing firm specializing in the development, production and post-market support of diagnostic and therapeutic active medical devices, including implantables and wearables for neuromodulation and other class three indications.
Velentium's core competencies include electrical design, mechanical design, embedded software, mobile apps, contract manufacturing, embedded cybersecurity, OT cybersecurity, systems engineering, human factors and usability, and automated test systems.
Velentium works with clients worldwide from startups seeking seed funding to established Fortune 100 companies.
Visit velentium.com to explore your next step in medical device development.