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Leadership

Welcome to Avation Medical

We’re cutting edge innovators pioneering next-generation therapies for life-changing conditions. We are the minds behind the Vivally® System, a patient-friendly, smart wearable bladder control therapy and mobile app for women and men with urge urinary incontinence and urinary urgency without the need for surgery, implants or drugs.

Avation Medical

The Avation Medical team is driven by a mission to bring to market patient-friendly systems that make the promise of neuromodulation more accessible to patients and their physicians. Our leaders and team members have decades of success in medical technology, neuromodulation and digital health and are working hard to develop solutions that return quality of life to patients across a variety of clinical conditions.

Management

Board of Directors

Jill Schiaparelli

Ms. Schiaparelli is passionate about bringing cutting-edge medical technologies to markets to help improve the lives of patients. With more than 20 years of experience in the healthcare industry, she has honed her expertise in leading innovative healthcare organizations, driving them to success with business strategy for healthcare technologies and care providers, specializing in global medical device commercialization, emerging technologies, strategic marketing, healthcare consumerism, and patient care pathway modeling.
Jill has held leadership roles with major healthcare companies such as Johnson & Johnson and Baxter as well as serving as an executive at high-growth, innovative companies such as ApaTech (UK), a company she helped sell to Baxter, AxoGen where she assisted their up-list to NASDAQ, InteloMed where she launched the CVInsight™ Monitoring and Informatics System, and Neurotechnology Innovations Translator, an incubator and investment vehicle to launch and grow companies in the neuromodulation space.
Jill has a MBA in Finance and Business Management from the Stern School of Business at New York University and a BS in Finance and International Management from the Questrom School of Business at Boston University.

Manish Vaishya

Dr. Vaishya has more than 25 years of experience in large corporations as well as early stage companies. His area of expertise spans class II/III medical devices including cochlear implants, pain management, drug delivery and urology/gynecology devices.
Manish brings a spirit of entrepreneurship and rigorous product development to Avation. He has helped invent, develop and launch a series of unique products for the hearing impaired, provided inspirational leadership for innovative implantable software-driven drug delivery systems, and led the development of devices and instrumentation for stress incontinence and other gynecology diseases.
Manish has authored numerous patents in medical device design, signal processing, digital control and instruments. He also has a breadth of knowledge in reliability, processes and quality systems in global manufacturing.
Manish has a Doctorate in Mechanical Engineering from The Ohio State University, a MBA in International Marketing from the Indira Gandhi National Open University, and a BS from the Indian Institute of Technology.

Darren Wennen

Mr. Wennen is an experienced business executive with over 20 years of broad commercial experience in both large and small medical device and DME companies. His focus on patient care, teambuilding, and relationship development have helped to forge lasting relationships with employees, peers, customers and business partners across industries in orthopedics, cardiovascular, women’s health, and venous and lymphatic medicine.
Prior to joining Avation, Darren served as VP of Marketing and Clinical Affairs, as well as SVP of Commercial Operations for Tactile Medical, helping to develop an underserved, reimbursement driven DME/wearable market. His success in strategic planning, clinical trials, team building, sales training and innovative marketing materials development, as well as a track record of new product development and launch, directly assisted in growing the company’s revenue from ~$40M to over $200M during his eight-year tenure, including involvement in an l IPO on the NASDAQ in 2016. Earlier in his career, Darren held management and leadership roles with Stryker Orthopedics, Gyrus/ACMI (now Olympus), St. Jude Medical (now Abbott) and Sterilmed (a J&J Company).
Darren holds an MBA in marketing and international finance from the University of St. Thomas (St. Paul, MN), and a BA from the University of Minnesota in political science and psychology.

Allison Robbins

Ms. Robbins is an experienced business executive with over 20 years of diverse experience as both a health care operator and investor. She has crafted strategic and financial plans, negotiated transactions and partnerships, and supported fundraising efforts for numerous medical device, biotechnology, and health IT companies. The dozens of investments she completed on behalf of venture capital funds have resulted in six IPOs and three M&A events to date, as well as marketed neuromodulation devices, remote surgical monitors, gene therapies, digital pathology diagnostics and real-world evidence datasets.
In addition to her role with Avation, Allison is managing director of Green Shoots Consulting, LLC, a finance and strategy consulting firm, where she has served clients such as Merck’s Global Health Innovation Fund and The Florida Institute. She previously served as CFO of AMRA Medical, an international radiomics company, working closely with its leadership and finance team to craft commercialization planning with an eye on cash management as it developed and launched new products. She also managed finance and operations for a group direct-pay/concierge primary care medical practice, where she worked with distributors and sales reps to purchase medical devices and vaccines and oversaw commercial insurance billing and collections. Earlier in her career, Allison held roles at Genzyme Corporation, Goldman Sachs, and Tullis Health Investors.
Ms. Robbins received her MBA with Honors from The Wharton School in Health Care Management and Finance, and her BA, summa cum laude, in Biochemistry and Economics from Dartmouth College. She is a CFA® charterholder.

Jackie Gerberry

Ms. Gerberry is a results-driven senior finance professional with extensive finance and operations experience in healthcare. In her numerous roles, she has transformed the effectiveness and efficiency of finance operations. Recognized for her sound fiscal and operational management and strategic partnership skills, Jackie leadership has resulted in enhanced revenue, reduced costs and improved profitability.
Jackie excels at mergers, acquisitions, and spin-offs by aligning the right structures and strategies for the organization’s success. She has combined her practical experience with internal and external reporting and systems implementation with her strong team-building, leadership, training, motivation and communication skills.
Jackie has a MBA in Finance and Strategy from the Booth School at the University of Chicago and a BBA in Accounting and Finance from St. Mary’s College.

Kimberly Wilkinson

With over 20 years of experience in the pharmaceutical and medical device industries, Ms. Wilkinson is charged with leading Avation’s clinical team in the development and execution of clinical trials.
Prior to joining Avation, Kimberly worked in a senior director position in clinical operations for Sollis Therapeutics, where she successfully directed the clinical trial for sciatica pain, managing 29 research sites and fully enrolling 300 Subjects in two trials in under one year. Previously, she was a Director of Advocacy Relations and Scientific Affairs for Pacira Pharmaceuticals, working to educate lawmakers at the Federal and State level on potential solutions to the opioid epidemic. She also held positions with Heron Therapeutic, Baxter Pharmaceuticals, PDL BioPharma, and The Armamentarium.
Kimberly has a Masters of Science in Health Sciences (MSHS) from The George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences in Washington, D.C., and a Bachelor of Business Administration in Organizational Behavior and Management from the C.T. Bauer College of Business at the University of Houston in Houston, Texas.

Tracy Cameron

Dr. Cameron is an internationally recognized researcher with over 25 years’ experience in the field of neuromodulation as well as over 20 years of industry experience. She is currently an adjunct faculty member in Neuroscience at the Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio.
As a graduate student, Dr. Cameron evaluated the tissue reaction and stimulation efficacy of an implantable muscle stimulator. As a researcher at St Jude Medical, she worked closely with many research facilities and university labs to evaluate product performance and safety in many novel areas of stimulation.
Tracy is an expert in clinical trial design and execution and has been involved in multiple product approvals through direct negotiation with regulatory bodies including FDA, TGA, TUV, MDA and CFDA. She has contributed to the research community by authoring numerous peer reviewed journal publications as well as several book chapters in the field of neuromodulation.
Tracy has a PhD in physiology from Queen’s University – Canada, a MSBME from the University of Miami and a BS in Biochemistry from Queen’s University – Canada.

Tom Shehab

Tom Shehab joined the Aviation Medical Board as the Chairperson in February 2020.
Tom joined Arboretum Ventures in 2014 as a Principal and became a Managing Partner in 2017. Prior to joining the Arboretum team, Tom served as a member of Arboretum’s Technical Advisory Board. Tom draws upon his extensive clinical, healthcare administration and operational experience to invest in medical device and IT enabled healthcare companies that focus on improving patient outcomes while decreasing healthcare costs. He also provides strategic support to Arboretum portfolio companies and served as Chief Medical Officer for ArborMetrix where he led strategic positioning and clinically focused efforts. Tom currently serves as Board Director for Avation Medical, Fifth Eye, Health Scholars and SonarMD and is a Board Observer for PEAR Therapeutics and has previously served as a board member for Aira Tech, ArborMetrix, Lucina Heath and nVision Medical.
Prior to joining Arboretum, Tom spent 12 years as a physician executive and practicing physician specializing in gastroenterology. He was involved in a number of entrepreneurial healthcare-related ventures and held multiple senior leadership roles. Most recently, Tom served as Chief of Staff for more than 1,000 physicians at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor and as the Chair of Medicine for Integrated Health Associates (IHA), a multi-specialty group consisting of 300+ providers. Both St. Joseph Mercy Hospital and IHA are part of Trinity Health.
Tom is engaged as board member for several healthcare and innovation focused organizations including the Cleveland Clinic Medical Device Advisory Council, the Center for Machine Learning and Health at Carnegie Mellon University, and was the immediate past Chair of the Michigan Venture Capital Association.
Tom earned an M.D. from Wayne State University, performed his residency, chief residency, and fellowship training at the University of Michigan Medical Center, and earned his Master’s in Medical Management from the Heinz School of Management at Carnegie Mellon University.

Raymond Huggenberger

Raymond Huggenberger joined the Avation Medical Board as a Director in January 2021.
Raymond built his career as a global executive with more than 20 years of successful sales, marketing, and general management experience in highly competitive industries. He had P&L responsibility for business units ranging in size from $40M to $580M as well as expertise in international sales expansion, cost management, manufacturing and distribution layout changes, M&A and turnaround/restructuring of struggling business units.
He currently serves on the boards of publicly traded medical device companies Inogen Inc. (INGN), Tactile Systems Technology Inc. (TCMD) and Intricon Micromedical Technology (IIN) as well as privately held medical device companies Sommetrics, Inc. and Zerigo Health. He also serves on the Technical Advisory Board of Arboretum Ventures LLC. He has held various management positions in medical device companies including Inogen as its CEO and president and Sunrise Medical Inc. as its president and chief operating officer.
Ray graduated from AKAD University in Rendsburg, Germany in Economics and completed the Advanced Marketing Strategies Program at INSEAD, Fontainebleau, France.

Jill Schiaparelli

Jill Schiaparelli joined the Avation Medical Board as a Director in January 2019.
Jill is passionate about bringing cutting-edge medical technologies to markets to help improve the lives of patients. With more than 20 years of experience in the healthcare industry, she has honed her expertise in leading innovative healthcare organizations, driving them to success with business strategy for healthcare technologies and care providers, specializing in global medical device commercialization, emerging technologies, strategic marketing, healthcare consumerism, and patient care pathway modeling.
Jill has held leadership roles with major healthcare companies such as Johnson & Johnson and Baxter as well as serving as an executive at high-growth, innovative companies such as ApaTech (UK), a company she helped sell to Baxter, AxoGen where she assisted their up-list to NASDAQ, InteloMed where she launched the CVInsight™ Monitoring and Informatics System, and Neurotechnology Innovations Translator, an incubator and investment vehicle to launch and grow companies in the neuromodulation space.
Jill has a MBA in Finance and Business Management from the Stern School of Business at New York University and a BS in Finance and International Management from the Questrom School of Business at Boston University.

Renee Selman

Renee Selman joined the Avation Medical Board as a Director in December 2020.
Renee is an accomplished pharmaceutical/medical device/healthcare services Senior Executive with extensive global and domestic experience in the healthcare industry. Her experience spans both public, private equity and start up environments and includes progressive assignments in general management with responsibility for commercialization of US and global products, R&D, regulatory strategy, strategic partnership development and deal making. In addition, Renee has extensive Board experience. Renee currently serves on the board of the Hunterdon Medical System, Career Wardrobe, and FEMSelect. Other relevant past board experience includes the Drug Information Association, Purdue University, and a small commercial private medical device company. Renee is also an active member of Robin Hood Ventures angel investing group in Philadelphia.
Currently Renee serves as CEO of FEMSelect. FEMSelect is an early commercial stage medical device company with an offering in the women’s health space.
(2016-2018) Renee served as the interim Chief Commercial Officer of Agile Therapeutics. Agile is a public, pre-revenue women’s health company that recently received FDA approval.
(2010-2015) Renee served as President of Catalina Health (division of Catalina Marketing) which was divested from Catalina and purchased by inVentiv Health (October 2013) and merged with an inVentiv business, Adheris. Renee was named the President of the newly combined entity Adheris Health and was responsible for the day-to-day management of the business.
Previously, Renee was Worldwide President of Ethicon Women’s Health and Urology (division of J&J) 2005-2010, a procedurally focused device company dedicated to improving the standard of care in a broad range of pelvic health conditions. Renee led an organizational turnaround growing sales 45%, improving net income and growing key emerging markets by more than 20% through market development. During her tenure at EWHU, Renee led multiple business development activities including acquisitions and licensing agreements. These changes and other commercial market innovations set the course for EWHU to double in size to reach approximately $500MM in less than 5 years. In this role, Renee led a cross-functional global board including R&D, medical affairs, operations, and other shared functions.
Renee has also served as the VP Sales & Marketing for J&J Wound Management. In this capacity Renee led a 200-person Sales & Marketing team growing the business over 20% each year while advancing 30% of the management team into positions of greater responsibility. While in the pharmaceutical division, Renee held multiple positions of increasing responsibility involving Sales, Marketing, and New Product Development. These experiences spanned multiple therapeutic areas and specialties. While at Ortho Pharmaceutical, Renee managed the launch of Ortho Evra®, exceeding all key product launch metrics and gaining significant direct to consumer experienceexperience.
She is a graduate of Purdue University with a major in Business and a minor in Chemistry. Renee enjoys traveling, running, cycling and scuba diving. She resides in Philadelphia with her husband.

Kevin Wasserstein

Kevin Wasserstein is a co-founder of Avation Medical, and has served on its board since inception. Kevin specializes in investing in, and building, medical device companies through their entire life cycle, from concept to commercialization.
Currently, Kevin serves as Corporate Vice President, Ventures, at Boston Scientific, where he provides leadership and oversight of Boston Scientific’s Venture investment activity, including more than 50 portfolio company investments spanning all stages of development.
Kevin currently serves, or has served, in board or advisory roles with companies which include: Acclarent (acquired: Johnson & Johnson), Autonomic Technologies, Ebb Therapeutics (acquired), Eargo (NASDAQ: EAR), LipoSonix (acquired: Medicis), Lutonix (acquired: Bard), Microfabrica (acquired: TechnoProbe), Neoguide (acquired: Intuitive Surgical), Oculeve (acquired: Allergan), Respicardia (acquired: Sorin), Rox Medical, Second Sight Medical (NASDAQ: EYES), Sollis Therapeutics, St. Francis Medical (acquired: Kyphon), The Innovation Factory.
Kevin previously held numerous operating leadership roles, including marketing and business development at Guidant Corporation, corporate business development and ventures at Guidant Compass, business development at Heartstream, and engineering development and management at Hughes Aircraft Company.
Kevin holds both Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Mechanical Engineering, specializing in product design, as well as an MBA, from Stanford University.
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