Speakers and Panelists

Binita S. Ashar, M.D., MBA, FACS, MAMSE, is the Founder and Principal of Clarity Surgical Advisors, where she advises medical technology companies on regulatory strategy, evidence development, and innovation in surgical devices, robotics, and AI-enabled technologies. She previously spent nearly 25 years at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, most recently as Director of the Office of Surgical and Infection Control Devices in FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, overseeing a broad portfolio of surgical technologies.

Dr. Ashar is a board-certified general surgeon and has held leadership roles at the intersection of medicine, regulation, and public health, including service as a White House Special Advisor for Medicine and Public Health. She is a Research Professor at Western Michigan University Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine and serves on the Board of the Society of Robotic Surgery and Institute for Surgical Excellence. Her current work focuses on helping emerging technologies move from innovation to responsible clinical adoption and on developing regulatory and evidence approaches for the increasingly connected, data-driven future of surgery.

Jason Bock, Ph.D., is CEO of CTMC, a joint venture between Resilience + UT MD Anderson Cancer Center. Formed in May 2022 to accelerate patient access to impactful cell therapies by bridging cell therapy development and manufacturing with MD Anderson’s clinical trial capabilities. In 2019, Jason joined MD Anderson from Teva Pharmaceuticals to build the Biologics Development group. The group purchased a 60,000 SF facility in the Texas Medical Center and has since formed multiple partnerships with both MD Anderson faculty and early-stage biotech firms to bring their products through the IND process.

Previously, Jason was Site Head and VP of Global CMC Biologics in the Specialty R&D Division of Teva Pharmaceuticals. He joined Teva through the acquisition of CoGenesys, a private biotech firm as a spinoff from Human Genome Sciences (HGS), where he worked after completing a Ph.D. at Stanford University in Molecular & Cellular Physiology.

Kyle Ettinger, M.D., D.D.S., is an associate professor of surgery within the Department of Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester.  He is a maxillofacial surgeon specializing in head and neck oncologic surgery and microvascular reconstruction.

Dr. Ettinger’s clinical interests in surgical innovation encompass using image-based tumor modeling, virtual surgical planning, 3D printing, and patient-specific implants to improve patient outcomes in head and neck oncology and reconstruction. Dr. Ettinger has published numerous manuscripts on leveraging virtual surgical planning and 3D printing to provide individualized surgery for patients. He has a keen interest in developing the future of this technology to incorporate augmented reality applications into daily surgical practice. He has developed several novel applications for virtual surgical planning and guided surgery that have been adopted by industry and are employed in modern standard-of-care reconstructive workflows. Dr. Ettinger is also heavily involved in clinical research and is the Mayo Clinic principal investigator of a multi-institutional phase II/III cooperative group clinical trial evaluating sentinel lymph node biopsy versus elective neck dissection in early-stage oral cavity squamous cell carcinoma.

Dr. Ettinger is the director of innovation within the Department of Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester. Together with Dr. Cornelius Thiels, associate chair of innovation, they lead the department’s innovation efforts to bring together partners in industry, with the goals of fostering product co-development, product commercialization, first-in-human trials, and novel technology adoption within the broader Mayo surgical ecosystem.

Jessica Foley, Ph.D., is Vice President of Strategic Initiatives at Profound Medical, a commercial-stage medical technology company pioneering customizable, incision-free ultrasound therapies for the treatment of diseased tissue. In this role, she leads cross-functional initiatives that drive corporate growth, cultivate strategic partnerships, strengthen stakeholder engagement, and advance the company’s advocacy and philanthropic efforts.

A passionate champion for patient-centered care, Dr. Foley created Let’s Huddle, Profound’s patient advocacy initiative that brings together patients, survivors, caregivers, and allies to expand awareness, education, and support for individuals affected by prostate disease.

A healthcare leader with extensive experience spanning medical technology, scientific innovation, and stakeholder engagement, Dr. Foley previously served as Managing Director and Chief Scientific Officer of the Focused Ultrasound Foundation. There, she oversaw scientific strategy, led alliance-building efforts with external stakeholders including governmental policymakers, regulatory agencies, and disease-specific foundations, and became a prominent voice championing the adoption of focused ultrasound as a transformative non-invasive therapeutic technology.

Earlier in her career, Dr. Foley held leadership and scientific roles at Insightec and Medtronic, contributing to the advancement and commercialization of innovative medical technologies. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Engineering in Biomedical Engineering from Duke University and a PhD in Bioengineering from the University of Washington.

Waleed Gibreel, M.B.B.S., an associate professor of Plastic Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Dr. Gibreel is the section chief of Craniofacial Surgery within the Division of Plastic Surgery and director of the Interdisciplinary Facial Reanimation Clinic at Mayo Clinic.

Dr. Gibreel specializes in pediatric and adult craniofacial reconstruction, with clinical expertise in congenital and traumatic ear reconstruction, including microtia surgery; cleft lip and palate repair; craniosynostosis surgery; and pediatric and adult facial reanimation.

In addition to his clinical practice, Dr. Gibreel is dedicated to surgical education, mentorship, and advancing the field through innovative research. He regularly contributes expert content, publishes in leading scientific journals, and is an active member of national plastic surgery and craniofacial professional societies.

Dr. Conrad Heid is co-founder of Symphera and a surgeon dedicated to advancing minimally invasive surgery through technology innovation. Drawing on his clinical experience, Conrad co-founded Symphera to address key limitations of current minimally invasive surgery and enable more continuous surgical workflows.

Meghana Helder, MD, is a board-certified cardiothoracic surgeon and the founder and CEO of Octin Health, a medical device company developing technology to improve the safety of aortic surgery. She completed her surgical training at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, including two years of translational research focused on tissue-engineered heart valves.

Dr. Helder’s clinical expertise spans complex aortic surgery, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and coronary revascularization. She has established multidisciplinary aortic and hypertrophic cardiomyopathy programs across community hospitals, bringing specialized care to broader patient populations.

At Octin Health, she translated a need identified in the operating room into a device development program, leading efforts across intellectual property, preclinical testing, regulatory strategy, fundraising, and clinical trial planning. Her work reflects a commitment to connecting surgical practice with practical innovation.

Dr. Helder has authored numerous peer-reviewed publications and serves on the editorial board of The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery and as a feature editor for Seminars in Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery. She is also dedicated to mentoring future surgeons and advancing surgeon-led innovation.

Monica Jain, MD is a Venture Partner at Wavemaker Three-Sixty Health – an early stage healthcare venture fund, the COO at Boston Health AI – building the world’s first AI clinical intelligence companion, CSO at REGENDO – developing a novel autologous stem cell-derived thyroid organoid alongside an automated biomanufacturing platform, and CEO of Dissect Health – a healthcare strategy consulting firm.

A board-certified former general and endocrine surgeon, Dr. Jain previously served as an Assistant Professor of Surgery and the Surgical Innovation Officer at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. Additionally, with a background in biomedical engineering and human factors and over a decade of experience across clinical, academic, and entrepreneurial settings, she brings a uniquely integrated perspective to healthcare innovation.

Dr. Jain is passionate about bridging the gap between cutting edge healthcare technologies and their real-world adoption.

Meraj Khan is the Chief Marketing Officer for Surgical Innovations (SI) within GE HealthCare’s Advanced Visualization Solutions (AVS) segment. With over 23 years of experience in the medical device industry and a foundation in biomedical engineering, Meraj brings a deep understanding of surgical technologies and strategic marketing to his leadership role.

Prior to leading SI, Meraj served as Vice President of Marketing for Surgical Visualization and Guidance (SVG), part of the BK Medical acquisition. In that role, he spearheaded global marketing efforts for real-time imaging technologies used in General Surgery, Neurosurgery, and Urology. Meraj played a key role in the global integration of BK Medical into GE HealthCare, aligning both commercial and internal operations. His career also includes a wide range of leadership positions in product support, commercial capital sales, portfolio management (upstream and downstream), and strategic marketing across advanced surgical software, imaging, navigation, and robotics.

Looking ahead, he will be instrumental in shaping the strategic direction of Surgical Innovations under AVS—bringing together SVG and Surgery to develop solutions that address the unmet needs of surgeons and strengthen partnerships with hospital systems worldwide.

Michael Kendrick, M.D., is the chair of the Department of Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester and a surgeon within the Division of Hepatobiliary and Pancreas Surgical Oncology. Dr. Kendrick holds the academic rank of professor of surgery at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science.

His research interests include benign and malignant diseases of the pancreas and liver, technical aspects of pancreatic surgery, and minimally invasive hepato-pancreato-biliary surgery. He is frequently invited to give presentations on his work both nationally and internationally and has authored numerous journal articles, book chapters and abstracts. He serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Gastrointestinal Surgery and holds reviewer responsibilities for prominent scientific publications.

Dr. Kendrick is a fellow of the American College of Surgeons and an honorary member of the Brazilian Society of Surgical Oncology. His additional professional memberships include the American Surgical Association, Americas Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Association, the International Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Association, and the Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract.

Dr. Kendrick earned his medical degree from George Washington University in Washington, DC. He completed his general surgery residency at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine in Rochester, Minnesota. After residency, he received additional training as a Mayo Foundation Scholar in hepatobiliary surgery (Mayo Clinic in Rochester and Paris, France) and minimally invasive surgery (Mount Sinai, New York).

Thomas Knox is co-founder and CEO of VitVio, which digitises the operating room in real-time 3D to deploy AI agents into surgical workflow. VitVio’s platform, Vetro, uses computer vision and ambient sensing to automate surgical phase logging, staff coordination, case duration estimates and operative documentation, and is deployed both the US and Europe. The company is part of Mayo Clinic Platform’s Solutions Studio program and has raised $10M to date.

Thomas spent the previous decade in senior executive roles at three hyper-growth companies: Kiwi.com, AiFi and VusionGroup. As Head of Product at AiFi he scaled autonomous checkout-free stores globally and white-labelled the technology to major retailers, and as Global VP of Product at VusionGroup he led a portfolio responsible over $1B revenue in twelve months. He is now working hand-in-hand with surgical teams to apply that experience to the operating room.

Dr. Rob Lentz is a Medical Director at Natera and GI Medical Oncologist. Dr. Lentz earned his BS from the University of Michigan, medical degree from Vanderbilt, residency at Northwestern, and fellowship at University of Colorado.

Before joining Natera, he was on faculty at the University of Colorado, where he cared for patients with and led clinical and translational research in gastrointestinal malignancies. At Natera, Rob leads Medical Affairs efforts in colorectal and anal cancers.

Travis McKenzie, M.D., is a professor of Surgery and endocrine surgeon at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, recognized for his minimally invasive surgical approach to complex endocrine disease. Dr. McKenzie is the vice chair of Education for the Department of Surgery.

His research focuses on improving outcomes for adrenal and endocrine disorders that are uncommon, aggressive, or technically challenging. Dr. McKenzie’s scholarly work has focused on adrenal cortical carcinoma, pancreatic insulinoma, and the surgical management of pediatric endocrine disease. This research is closely integrated with his clinical practice, allowing new insights to directly inform surgical decision‑making and technique.

Dr. McKenzie graduated with honors from Tufts University School of Medicine and completed his residency in general surgery at Mayo Clinic. He then completed two consecutive fellowships in Endocrine Surgery and Minimally Invasive Surgery at Harvard.

Chas McKhann serves as the Executive Chairman of Distalmotion, a surgical robotics company that is commercializing the Dexter® robot for general surgery and gynecological surgery procedures in the ASC environment. Chas also serves as a Board member of Exagen, Inc., a publicly-traded diagnostics company and Envoy Medical, a publicly traded medical device company that is developing the first fully implantable cochlear implant. He is also a Sr. Advisor to McKinsey & Company, the global strategy consulting firm.

Previously, Mr. McKhann served as CEO and/or Chief Commercial Officer of four companies that have been acquired for ~$3.5 billion. He served as CEO of Silk Road Medical, and prior to that, CEO of Apollo Endosurgery, both publicly-traded medical device companies that were acquired by Boston Scientific.

Mr. McKhann previously served as Chief Commercial Officer at Torax Medical and at Intersect ENT and has held marketing leadership roles at Boston Scientific and Cordis, a Johnson and Johnson company. Mr. McKhann started his career as a strategy consultant at McKinsey & Company.

Mr. McKhann received a B.A. in political science and an M.B.A. from Stanford University.

Saahil Mehta, M.D., is a board-certified plastic surgeon and founder of Plexāā Ltd., a venture-backed medical device company transforming how patients prepare for surgery.

With a distinguished career across London’s leading institutions — including The Royal Marsden and Chelsea and Westminster Hospitals — Saahil has spent years at the intersection of clinical excellence and innovation. His research during training demonstrated that Supraphysiological Preconditioning — improving blood flow to the skin before surgery — could significantly reduce wound-healing complications, particularly in breast cancer patients.

But it was a question he heard repeatedly in the clinic — “What can I do to prepare?” — that sparked the next evolution. Recognising a critical gap in patient education and resources, Saahil developed an app to answer everything patients didn’t have time to ask, giving rise to BLOOM⁴³’s integrated Prehab programme — putting the power of preparation into patients’ hands.

BLOOM⁴³ is now the world’s first “PrehabTM” platform technology to combine a wearable preconditioning device and a prehabilitation app for women undergoing breast cancer surgery, winning FemTech Product of the Year at the MedTech World Awards. Selected for the 2024 MedTech Innovator Accelerator and voted among its Top 5 Visionary Companies, Saahil has since relocated to Los Angeles to lead BLOOM⁴³’s U.S. launch — bringing the future of surgical PrehabTM to patients worldwide.

Frederic H. Moll, M.D., is widely recognized as the pioneer of surgical robotics, having founded Intuitive Surgical in 1995. In the past 3 decades, Dr. Moll has created a number of medical robotics companies, most recently Auris Health, sold to J&J in 2019.

Dr. Moll served as the Chief Development Officer of Johnson & Johnson’s Medical Device Group from April 2019 to March 2023. Dr. Moll is a director of a number of leading healthcare companies, including Procept BioRobotics, SS Innovations, Insightec, Neptune Medical and Vitestro. He is a general partner of Sonder Capital and a senior advisor to JPMorgan’s newly formed Healthcare Venture Fund.

Dr. Moll earned an M.D. from the University of Washington School of Medicine, an M.S. degree from Stanford University, and a B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley.

Pablo Morales, M.D., leads the clinical and medical vision for Veranex’s Innovation CRO (iCRO) business, helping clients navigate the development of innovative medical technologies through patient-centered, scientifically rigorous, and regulatory-compliant strategies.

He brings more than 15 years of clinical, regulatory, and scientific leadership experience spanning medical device development, clinical research, real-world evidence, and regulatory affairs.

Prior to joining Veranex, Dr. Morales served in senior leadership roles at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), including Chief Medical Officer in the Office of Clinical Evidence and Analysis and Senior Medical Advisor in the Office of Clinical Policy. During his tenure, he provided clinical and regulatory oversight for more than 1,000 medical device submissions and played a key role in advancing several FDA initiatives, including the Early Feasibility Studies (EFS) Program, the implementation of Real-World Evidence (RWE) initiatives, and the Benefit-Risk Framework, helping balance patient safety with timely access to innovative technologies.

A trained vascular and endovascular surgeon, Dr. Morales earned his medical degree from Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana in Colombia. He completed advanced clinical training at Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospital in London and a research fellowship at the Cleveland Clinic.

Throughout his career, Dr. Morales has remained committed to advancing innovation that improves patient outcomes while upholding the highest standards of scientific, ethical, and regulatory excellence.

Joe Mullings has been building companies and careers since 1989. He is the Founder, Chairman and CEO of The Mullings Group, including TMG Search and Dragonfly. The search firm, with over three decades in the industry, is responsible for more than 9,000 successful searches in medtech / healthtech / life sciences with clients ranging from multi-billion-dollar companies to emerging high-tech organizations worldwide. TMG’s international presence and work with over 900 companies allow them to provide solutions to the clients they partner with across the globe.

As the first search firm to integrate media and talent access, Dragonfly was launched as a media production company, complete with a state-of-the-art studio, for use by clients and partners for attention and awareness. Dragonfly is the media machine behind the 9-time Award winning video docuseries, “TrueFuture,” of which Joe is the host. He is also the founder of TMGPulse, a MedTech news and opinion website.

Joe is an active member of the medtech and investor community. He sits on industry boards and serves as an adviser to many emerging tech startups and technology accelerators as well as being an angel investor. He holds an engineering degree from The University of Dayton, Ohio.

Amel Najjar is the Founder and CEO of MedGEO, a procedural intelligence company transforming how healthcare providers document, understand, and act on what happens at the point of care. Developed by clinicians from the start, MedGEO uses AI, automation, and proprietary smart-vision technology to create a more accurate source of truth across procedural workflows, giving surgical teams and health systems greater visibility into clinical, operational, and financial performance.

With more than 20 years of experience spanning field hospitals and advanced operating rooms, Amel brings a distinctive perspective on where healthcare systems break down, from resource-limited environments to leading institutions. She has led surgical teams in complex settings and consistently focused on using technology to improve accuracy, access, efficiency, and care delivery.

Amel is also the Founder of the Children of War Foundation, an international nonprofit that has reached more than 62,000 children worldwide through access to life-saving medical care and education.

She serves on multiple boards, including with the International Rescue Committee’s Airbel Impact Lab, the IRC’s research and innovation arm. There, she has co-chaired initiatives including the Innovation Fund, which supports socially driven startups and programs developing bold, research-backed solutions for communities affected by conflict and crisis.

Across MedGEO, Children of War Foundation, and her work with NGOs and civil society organizations, Amel focuses on using technology, evidence, and innovation to strengthen complex systems when the stakes are highest.

Amel holds an MBA from the University of Oxford, a certificate in AI in Healthcare from MIT Sloan, and a BA in International Relations and Political Science from UC San Diego.

Cynthia Harris Perazzo is a healthcare strategist and innovator. As Co-Founder and President of Sovato, Cynthia drives the company’s mission to enable access to highest quality surgery and procedures for everyone, everywhere through the world’s first device-agnostic remote robotic surgery and procedures platform.

Cynthia spent 2016 to 2022 as an Executive Vice President at AVIA, helping health system members digitally transform to drive growth, improve patient outcomes, and increase profitability. In her role on the executive leadership team and leader of AVIA’s Insights and Advisory team, she drove the thought leadership agenda and product delivery efforts in the Centers for Consumerism, Operational Transformation, and Care Transformation. Previously, she led the Center for Consumerism and was the west regional leader for the Client Engagement team.

Before joining AVIA, Cynthia served as the Senior Vice President of Strategy & Business Development at Hoag Health, a regional health system in Newport Beach, California. Cynthia led organizational strategic planning and business development in support of Hoag’s mission to provide the highest quality healthcare services to the communities of Orange County and beyond. From 2000 – 2009, Cynthia served as Vice President of Corporate Development for Premier, Inc., a national alliance of health systems, where she was responsible for corporate strategy, mergers and acquisitions, strategic partnerships, venture investments, and new business formation.

Entrepreneurial in nature, Cynthia co-founded and served as VP of Business Development for nTrusted, Inc., a consumer-focused, health-related software company in San Diego. Cynthia led business development, sales and marketing with a new venture developing innovative, point-of-care clinical information systems.  Previously, Cynthia was a consultant with Boston Consulting Group and an analyst in the investment banking group at Merrill Lynch & Co.

Cynthia holds a master’s degree in business administration from the Harvard Business School and bachelor’s degree in business administration with honors in finance from the University of Texas at Austin.

Will Perry, M.B., Ch.B., M.P.H., FRACS, FACS, FASCRS, is an associate professor of Surgery and colon and rectal surgeon at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. He is vice chair of Practice for the Department of Surgery and the director of the International Fellowship in Colon & Rectal Surgery.

Dr. Perry has specialist interests in functional and oncological pelvic surgery and co-directs Mayo Clinic’s Surgical AI2 lab.

He completed his surgical training with the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and his advanced fellowship training with Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust and Mayo Clinic. Prior to surgical training, Dr. Perry completed a Master of Public Health at Harvard University as a Fulbright Scholar and worked as an external consultant to the World Health Organization in Geneva. He also served on the Advisory Board of Safe Surgery New Zealand.

Stephanie Polites, M.D., is an associate professor of Surgery and chair of the Division of Pediatric Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Her clinical focus includes pediatric surgical oncology, vascular and lymphatic malformations, and other pediatric conditions.

Dr. Polites leads a precision pediatric surgical oncology clinical trials and technology research program. Dr. Polites’ studies include the investigation of novel fluorescent agents that can help surgeons distinguish cancerous tissues from healthy, noncancerous structures during resection. Beyond the operating room, she studies surgical survivorship, using smartwatches and quality-of-life data to improve long-term cancer and wellness outcomes. Dr. Polites is nationally active in collaborative pediatric surgical oncology research and has extensive experience in collecting and analyzing multi-institutional data to improve outcomes for patients with rare conditions requiring surgery, such as pediatric cancer.

Dr. Polites earned her medical degree from Case Western Reserve University and completed her general surgery residency at Mayo Clinic. Dr. Polites also completed fellowships in vascular anomalies and oncology, as well as pediatric surgery.

Todd E. Rasmussen, M.D., is a professor of Surgery and consultant in the Department of Surgery’s Division of Vascular and Endovascular Surgery at Mayo Clinic. He is Director of the Clinic Gonda Vascular Center and through an agreement with Mayo Clinic, Dr. Rasmussen serves as Chief Surgical Officer of Humacyte Global, Inc. In this role he leads a team of professionals in the study and safe and effective integration of a pipeline of regenerative medicine products for cardiovascular surgery.

Dr. Rasmussen earned his medical degree from the Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine and completed surgical residency with the United States Air Force before returning to Mayo Clinic to complete a vascular surgery fellowship. In 2021, Dr. Rasmussen joined the Mayo Clinic staff after a career as an Air Force surgeon during which he completed deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan, and other parts of the world, and led research programs and appropriations for the U.S. Department of Defense. Among several awards, he was presented with the Defense Superior Service Medal upon retirement at the rank of Colonel. In addition to his surgical service at Mayo Clinic, Dr. Rasmussen has served as Vice Chair of Education for the Department of Surgery.

His innovation efforts have resulted in more than 350 publications, an h-index of more than 70 and more than 20,000 citations. Dr. Rasmussen has patents in endovascular devices and vascular shunt technologies and has frequently collaborated with industry and the U.S FDA.

Morgan joined Mayo Clinic Ventures in 2023 as a Technology Development Associate, where she supports the advancement of Mayo’s intellectual property and helps identify new digital and device technologies for commercialization. Prior to joining Mayo, she worked as an engineer in the semiconductor industry, where she worked on high-volume device fabrication.

Morgan earned her Ph. D. in Physical Chemistry from the University of Wisconsin- Madison.

Janani Reisenauer, M.D., is the Division Chair of Thoracic Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. She has been with Mayo Clinic since finishing her fellowship at the Mayo Clinic School of Graduate Medical Education in 2018. Dr. Reisenauer was the world’s first dual fellowship-trained and board-certified interventional pulmonologist and thoracic surgeon, and remains one of the very few people to achieve both certifications.

She earned both her bachelor’s degree and Doctor of Medicine degree at the University of Alabama in Birmingham, Alabama, and completed her residency and both fellowships at the Mayo Clinic School of Graduate Medical Education in Rochester, Minnesota.

Dr. Reisenauer and her team specialize in robotic bronchoscopy, a minimally invasive technique that allows her to detect lung cancers with more accuracy than traditional bronchoscopy. Earlier detection allows people to begin treatment sooner and leads to better results. She is currently involved in clinical trials that deliver breakthrough cancer treatment through the bronchoscope or with surgery within minutes of diagnosis.

Dr. Reisenauer’s drive to innovate extends beyond the surgical suite. She is the Medical Director of Research Innovation Business Development, and the chair of the Bold. Forward. Unbound Surgical Solutions Subcommittee for the surgical and procedural practice.

Siddarth Satish serves as Vice President, AI at Stryker, where he leads the company’s center of excellence in AI and Spatial Computing and works with Stryker’s commercial divisions on their AI/ML and mixed reality initiatives. Siddarth serves on the executive leadership team of the company’s Ortho Tech Division and chairs the company’s AI Governance Operating Committee. Siddarth previously served on the leadership team of the Digital, Robotics and Enabling Technologies division and served as Vice President, Digital Innovation for the Surgical Technologies Business Unit.

Prior to joining Stryker, Siddarth served as Chairman and CEO of Gauss Surgical, a venture-backed healthcare AI company from its inception through six US and global regulatory approvals (including FDA De Novo clearance), post-market clinical studies, market launch, and its acquisition by Stryker in 2021. Inspired while observing surgeries in graduate school, Siddarth founded Gauss in 2011 to develop a novel method of accurately measuring surgical blood loss using computer vision and machine learning techniques. Under his leadership, Gauss scaled to over 250,000 surgical procedures annually, raised $60 million in venture capital from SoftBank Ventures and several strategic healthcare investors, and received the Apple Design Award, which recognizes the best in design, innovation, and technology on Apple platforms.

Siddarth has served as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at StartX, Stanford University’s Startup Accelerator, and has held research roles at Gilead Sciences and at UC Berkeley, where his work in computer-aided drug discovery and molecular modeling was published widely.

Siddarth immigrated to the U.S. from India at the age of seven. He received a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley and an M.S. in Bioengineering from the UC Berkeley-UCSF Joint Graduate Group in Bioengineering, and held a SIMdesign fellowship in the Department of Surgery at Stanford University. He holds over 50 patents in the fields of surgery, diagnostics, and computer vision and was named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in Healthcare.

Dr. Shah serves as the Mr. and Mrs. Ronald F. Kinney Executive Dean of Research Honoring Ronald F. Kinney, Jr. and the Carol M. Gatton Professor of Digestive Diseases Research, Honoring Peter Carryer, M.D. at Mayo Clinic in Rochester. He has been on staff at Mayo Clinic for 25 years and previously served as Chairs of the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology and Department of Medicine. Dr. Shah
has maintained an NIH-funded research program at Mayo Clinic for almost 25 years, which focuses broadly on alcohol related liver disease, cirrhosis, portal hypertension and its complications, with over 350 peer-reviewed publications in prestigious journals such as Journal of Clinical Investigation, Nature, Proceedings of National Academy of Science, New England Journal of Medicine and others. His research spans from laboratory-based studies to clinical trials to informatics; the program’s achievements are recognized by his title as Mayo Clinic Distinguished Investigator. He has lectured widely both nationally and internationally.

Dr. Shah maintains an active clinical practice focused in hepatology.

Outside of Mayo Clinic, Dr. Shah has served on the Governing Board of the American Association for the Study of Liver Disease, Council for the American Gastroenterologic Association, and National Advisory Council for National Institute for Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. He has served as Associate Editor for multiple peer-reviewed academic journals, including Hepatology, Journal of Hepatology, and American Journal of Gastroenterology. Dr. Shah is a member of the prestigious American Society of Clinical Investigation (ASCI) and Association of American Physicians (AAP).

Dr. Shah received his undergraduate, medical, and clinical medicine training at Northwestern University. He obtained advanced clinical and research postdoctoral fellowship training in hepatology and liver disease at Yale University.

Ofer Shalev is the founder and CEO of New Phase Ltd., a company he established in 2013 together with co-founder Dr. Rafi Hof. Prior to founding New Phase, they successfully led Redent Nova, a medical device company that developed disruptive technology for minimally invasive dental treatment.

Their shared experience in building breakthrough medical technologies laid the foundation for New Phase’s mission to transform cancer care.

Throughout his career, Ofer has been driven by innovation and disruptive technologies. Over the past 20 years, he has held executive leadership positions in the medical device industry, following an earlier career in the high-tech sector. Earlier in his career, he was recruited as Vice President of the Jerusalem Bank during its strategic transformation from a specialized mortgage bank into a full commercial bank.

Ofer holds an MBA from Edinboro University.

At New Phase, Ofer has led every stage of the company’s development—from defining its vision and corporate strategy to fundraising, regulatory execution, technology development, and clinical translation. Under his leadership, the company has built expertise in metallic nanoparticles, electromagnetic field-based cancer therapy, preclinical and clinical protocol development, and regulatory pathways in both Israel and the United States.

Rory Smoot, M.D., is a consultant in the Division of Hepatobiliary and Pancreas Surgical Oncology and is vice chair for research in the Department of Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Dr. Smoot holds a joint appointment in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. He also serves as medical director of the Surgical Clinical Research Office and associate medical director of the Mayo Clinic Comprehensive Cancer Center Clinical Trials Office. He joined the staff of Mayo Clinic in 2012 and holds the academic ranks of professor of surgery and professor of biochemistry and molecular biology, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science.

Dr. Smoot’s research lab focuses on evaluating the molecular determinants of therapeutic response in cholangiocarcinoma and the underlying molecular mechanisms of liver regeneration. His team uses several techniques and models to understand these processes, including next-generation sequencing and advanced proteomic analysis. Dr. Smoot is also co-leader of the Mayo Clinic Hepatobiliary SPORE funded by the National Cancer Institute, and he serves on the Executive Committee of the Digestive Disease Research Core Center funded by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. Dr. Smoot is frequently invited to give presentations both nationally and internationally and has authored numerous journal articles, book chapters and abstracts.

Dr. Smoot completed his medical degree at Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine and subsequently completed clinician-investigator and surgery residencies at Mayo Clinic School of Graduate Medical Education, followed by a fellowship in hepatobiliary surgery at the University of Toronto in Toronto, Ontario.

Dr. Scott Tackett is the CEO and President of AIRA Sciences, a leader in AI-driven, non-invasive, affordable and simple multi-cancer early detection platform utilizing a cheek swab. A seasoned medtech executive with over 25 years of experience, Dr. Tackett specializes in health economics, international market access and development, and the commercialization of robotic and AI health technologies.

During his transformative 11-year tenure at Intuitive Surgical, Dr. Tackett served Global Vice President of Market Access, Value & Economics and Chief of Staff to the CEO and Executive Leadership Team, directly shaping the company’s high-level global corporate strategy and led the strategic market access and development initiatives that systematically dismantled economic and patient access barriers to robotic-assisted surgery worldwide. By designing robust health economic, outcomes and patient access research that demonstrated long-term clinical, economic and patient access value, his organization opened and established new markets across more than 30 countries, directly driving the institutionalization of the da Vinci Surgical System and scaling annual corporate revenues from $2B to $11B.

His deep expertise in health economics, implementation science and global health policy also spans prior leadership roles at Baxter International, Johnson & Johnson, and St. Jude Medical. A dedicated academic, Dr. Tackett is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Tulane University and sits on the international board of the Survey of Medical Assessment for Robotic Technology at Peking University. He holds a Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) from Indiana University, where his research focused on the implementation effectiveness of lung cancer screening, as well as an MHA and MPH from Tulane University in healthcare strategy and economics.

Cornelius Thiels, D.O., MBA, FACS, FSSO, is an associate professor of surgery and associate professor of health services research within the Department of Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester.

As a surgical oncologist in the Division of Hepatobiliary and Pancreas Surgical Oncology, he specializes in managing retroperitoneal sarcomas and pancreatic cancer. He also has extensive training and experience in the treatment of neuroendocrine tumors, gastrointestinal stromal tumor (GIST), gastric cancer and metastatic colorectal cancer. Dr. Thiels has special expertise in multimodality treatment of advanced or metastatic cancers, combining surgery with radiation, chemotherapy, or immunotherapy. Dr. Thiels utilizes minimally invasive techniques to perform various operations (including robotic surgery) and leads the Hepatic Artery Infusion Pump Chemotherapy program at Mayo Clinic.

Dr. Thiels is the associate chair of innovation for the Department of Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester. Together with Dr. Kyle Ettinger, director of innovation, they lead the department’s innovation efforts to bring together partners in industry with the goals of fostering product co-development, product commercialization, first-in-human trials, and novel technology adoption within the broader Mayo surgical ecosystem.

He is also the associate chair of data and analytics for Mayo Clinic’s Department of Surgery and the director of a Surgical AI2 (“Squared”) Lab.

Karin Tollefson, PharmD, is Chief Oncology Medical Officer at Pfizer, leading the Global Oncology Medical Affairs Division. Prior to Pfizer, she served as Senior Vice President and Head of Global Medical Affairs at Seagen, where she guided the successful launch of three medicines and built a global medical organization.

Dr. Tollefson has over 30 years of pharmaceutical industry experience, including leadership roles at Eli Lilly and Company across clinical operations, clinical development, portfolio & program management, and global medical affairs.

During her career she has contributed to the launch of nine new medicines in U.S. and international markets across multiple therapeutic areas. Dr. Tollefson currently serves on the Board of Verastem Oncology and has been a director on several nonprofit boards. She earned her Doctor of Pharmacy from the University of Kansas.