Board of Directors

David Collier, MD, Managing Director, CMEA Ventures

Dr. David Collier joined CMEA Ventures as a Managing Director in 2001. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of three CMEA portfolio companies, Arcadia Biosciences, Sorbent Therapeutics, and VeraLight. He also serves as a Board Observer at Bayhill Therapeutics and Biomimetic Pharmaceuticals. Previously, Dr. Collier was a Managing Director at Burrill & Company, a private merchant bank focused exclusively on life science companies, where he played a leading role in the management of the company's life science venture capital funds. Before joining Burrill, Dr. Collier served as a consultant at Arthur D. Little and Magainin Pharmaceuticals. Earlier in his career, Dr. Collier was Assistant Vice President at First Options of Chicago where he directed a group of traders and managed a large portfolio of futures and options. Dr. Collier has an M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, an M.B.A. from the Wharton School, and a B.A. in Physics from Wesleyan University.

Mike Connolly, Venture Partner, vSpring Capital

Mike Connolly is a Venture Partner with vSpring Capital and CEO of vSpring portfolio company Mirabilis Medica. As former head of vSpring’s New Mexico office, he led VeraLight’s series A financing. Prior to joining vSpring, Mike cofounded 7 biomedical companies, including Novacept (acquired for $325M) and Cohesion (acquired for $40M). Prior to this, Mike was a Navy officer aboard a destroyer and a physics professor at the U.S. Naval Academy. He holds a Stanford M.B.A, MIT M.S., Naval Academy B.S., and Professional Engineer license. Mike is a director of VeraLight, Aspen Avionics, and Mirabilis Medica.

M. Ries Robinson, MD, Chief Operating Officer, Luminous Medical, Inc.

Dr. Robinson is the Chief Operating Officer for Luminous Medical, one of four spin-outs from InLight Solutions. Dr. Robinson continues to serve as Chairman of the Board for InLight and as a director for VeraLight, Luminous Medical, TruTouch Technologies and Lumidigm. Prior to joining Luminous Medical, Dr. Robinson was Chief Executive Officer, President and Director of Research for InLight Solutions. He initiated research into non-invasive blood chemistry monitoring in collaboration with Dr. R. Philip Eaton of the University of New Mexico School of Medicine (UNM-SOM) and Dr. David Haaland, of Sandia in 1988. Since that time, Dr. Robinson has led Sandia’s and UNM-SOM’s research efforts in this field, and has co-authored several comprehensive US patents and patent applications to which InLight Solutions now holds exclusive rights. He has authored several peer-reviewed technical articles, received the Distinguished Achievement Award from the New Mexico Inventor of the Year Program in 1992, and was named the New Mexico Inventor of the Year in 1994

Dr. Robinson graduated from Stanford University in 1987 with a B.S/M.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering with an emphasis in controls engineering. He served as a biomedical engineer for Nellcor, Inc. in 1988. He received an M.D. degree from UNM-SOM in 1991 and undertook extensive additional studies in electrical and systems engineering. Dr. Robinson completed a post-doctoral research fellowship with a joint research appointment at Sandia and UNM-SOM in 1992.

Lisa Suennen, Managing Member, Psilos and Chairman of the Board, VeraLight, Inc.

Lisa Suennen, who joined Psilos at its inception in 1998, heads Psilos' West Coast office and focuses primarily on investments in the medical device and healthcare services sectors. She serves as a board member and/or advisor to several of Psilos' portfolio companies, including Angioscore, InSound Medical, Estech, Navitas, Health Hero Network, Definity Health (exited) and VeraLight.

Prior to Psilos, Lisa held various senior executive roles during her nine years at Merit Behavioral Care, including Senior Vice President/General Manager of the Public Sector Division, Senior Vice President of Pacific Region Operations and Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing. During her tenure at Merit, Lisa actively participated in the acquisition and integration of regional managed care companies and the company's initial public offering. Lisa left Merit after its sale to Magellan Health Services in March of 1998.

Prior to joining Merit, Lisa served as Worldwide Product Manager for INGRES/Relational Technology, Inc., a relational database company, where she had responsibility for development, marketing and distribution of the company's UNIX PC software product. Prior to INGRES, Lisa served as Director of U.S. Market Development and as Manager, U.S. Government and Industry Relations for X/Open, an international computer industry standards setting and lobbying consortium. Earlier, Lisa spent several years at Regis McKenna, Inc., an international high technology marketing and public relations firm, responsible for government relations and public relations strategy for client companies in the software and healthcare areas. Lisa holds an M.A. in political science, a B.A in political science and a B.A. in mass communications, all from the University of California, Berkeley.

Karen Talmadge, Ph.D., CSO, Kyphon Products, Medtronic Spinal and Biologics

Dr. Karen Talmadge has 25 years of experience in the healthcare industry. She co-founded Kyphon Inc., a minimally invasive spine company acquired by Medtronic in 2007. Until then, she served as a member of its board of directors from inception, as Chief Science Officer from 2003, and as Executive Vice President from 1998. During its start-up phase from 1994-1998, she served as Kyphon’s President, Chief Executive Officer and Treasurer. Prior to Kyphon, Dr. Talmadge held a variety of research and business positions at the biotechnology company Scios Inc., including Vice President, Research and Development for Meta Bio, its diabetes and obesity subsidiary. From 2004-2007, she served on the board of the American Diabetes Association, and currently serves on the American Diabetes Association’s Research Foundation Board. Dr. Talmadge is also on the boards of Amplyx Pharmaceuticals, Cartilix, Inc., Gynesonics, Inc., the Spine Masters Institute of the North American Spine Society, and Life Science Angels. She received the 2004 Patient Quality of Life Award from the International Myeloma Foundation, and the 2006 Innovator of the Year, Special Contributor in Healthcare Award from the Professional Women’s Healthcare Alliance. She was profiled in the “From the Innovator’s Workbench” series by Stanford University. She is a co-inventor on 20 issued U.S. patents, and has published numerous scientific articles. She is an invited lecturer at business, scientific and medical conferences, and a mentor for young entrepreneurs. Dr. Talmadge conducted post-doctoral research at Harvard University and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. She holds an A.B. cum laude in Biology from Bryn Mawr College and a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Harvard University

David VanAvermaete, Chairman of the Board and CEO, VeraLight, Inc.

David Van Avermaete has 22 years of experience in the diabetes field with specific expertise in home blood glucose monitoring and medical diagnostics. He is a former US president of the LifeScan division of Johnson & Johnson. During his 13 year tenure at LifeScan, David grew annual sales from under $100 million to over $1.0 billion and improved LifeScan’s market position from a distant third to number one. Prior to LifeScan, David was the Director of Marketing for home blood glucose monitoring products at Roche Diagnostics. In addition, David developed marketing and sales strategy for Biotope, a venture capital start-up focused on medical diagnostics. At Syntex Medical Diagnostics, he led the marketing and sales effort for a start-up division focused on physician office diagnostics. David has a B.S. in chemistry from Ball State University, an M.S. in medical technology from the University of Arizona and an M.B.A. from the University of Arizona.

James Woodburn, MD, MS, CEO, Woodburn Health Consulting, LLC

Dr. Jim ‘Woody’ Woodburn has served in executive leadership roles in many areas including CEO of Woodburn Health Consulting since 2006. This company provides leadership support to clients involved in accelerating consumer directed healthcare, clinical outcomes measurement and improvement and new medical products and services development and launch. Dr. Woodburn served as Chief Medical Officer for MinuteClinic, Inc. for 2 years taking the company to widespread national expansion leading to the sale of the company to CVS Caremark. He was the corporate medical director for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (BCBSMN), served on two Boards of innovative subsidiaries of BCBSMN, provided marketing support and sales acquisitions to Fortune 500 firms headquartered in MN, and led the technology assessment committee for many years. Dr. Woodburn was also one of the founders and Chairman of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association’s National Medical Management Forum which formed the largest US group of health plan medical management leaders. He is residency trained and was the first Fellow in emergency medicine at Hennepin County Medical Center from 1984-1988. Dr. Woodburn received his M.D., M.S. (Biomedical Engineering) and B.S. (Electrical and Computer Engineering) from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.