Ep 53 - Herrera on how military lessons led to Medtech career; Ulmer ready to redo landmark FDA survey

In this week’s podcast, Derek Herrera explains how a serious battle injury he received while leading Marines in Afghanistan led him to build a career in medtech. Herrera has founded two companies – Spinal Singularity and Habit Camera – to create devices that can improve and save the lives of people who need help the most. Herrera also explains how his military training is serving him so well in medtech and how the medical device industry would benefit from including more veterans in its workforce. We’ll also hear from Kwame Ulmer, principal at Ulmer Ventures and a lecturer at UCLA Anderson’s School of Management, about an effort his helping to lead to update the landmark study compiled by Josh Makower in 2010. The study blasted a regulatory process that it called “unpredictable, inefficient and expensive.” Its finding led to introspection and changes, according to Ulmer who served at the FDA at the time. Now Ulmer is working with UCLA leaders to update the study. He’s hoping to connect with 200 medical device and digital health executives to understand how they’re working with the agency. For more information go to MedtechStudy.com. For more information on the original study go here - https://www.massdevice.com/study-fda-related-activities-cost-24-million-510k/ Meanwhile, Medtech Media Mogul Chris Newmarker, executive editor of life sciences, will unveil his Newmarker’s Newsmakers including reports from Google, Varian, Boston Scientific, Hologic, LumiraDx, and a report detailing racial inequity in how LVADs are implanted. Subscribe to this podcast on all major podcast applications.