Dr. Riccardo Braglia has a degree in Business Economics with specialization in Industrial Business Management at Bocconi University of Milan. He is the Entrepreneur and CEO of the HELSINN GROUP and a member of the Board of Directors of the HELSINN HOLDING SA, Switzerland. He is also the Managing Director of Helsinn Healthcare SA, Lugano, Managing Director of Helsinn Advanced Synthesis SA, Biasca, member of the Board of Helsinn Birex Pharmaceuticals Ltd, Dublin, Ireland and Chairman of Helsinn Therapeutics (US) Inc., Iselin NJ, USA. He is board member of Thorne Research Inc. USA, WellnessFX Inc. USA, Lyfebulb Inc. USA, Sinomedica SA Switzerland and member of the avisory board of Windham Healthcare fund. He is also board member of the Ticino Chamber of Commerce and Swiss American Chamber of Commerce. He won the 2012 Best Entrepreneur of Ticino and the 2013 E&Y Swiss Entrepreneur of the Year Award.

Dr. Ingo Braun received a PhD in chemistry in 1999. He is working since over 16 years in the medical device field. In 2006 he joined Nobel Biocare as Director for Clinical Applications at the Headquarters in Zurich, Switzerland. Since 2008 he is leading the Global Clinical Research Department and is responsible for the clinical evaluation from a regulatory perspective and the implementation and management of all aspects of clinical trials worldwide. He leads a multi-national clinical research team and lectures worldwide.

Dr. De Ponti, a Pharmacist by training and an EU Qualified Person, is Head of Corporate New Ventures and Strategic Investments for Helsinn International Services, the advisor company to the new Helsinn Investment Fund, part of the Helsinn Group. The new Helsinn fund aims to complement and expand the presence of Helsinn in early stage companies, contributing to the progression of new drugs, medical devices and diagnostics mainly in oncology therapeutics, oncology supportive care, metabolism and gastro-intestinal areas.From 2008 to when he joined the new fund in 2016, Dr. De Ponti was Head of Corporate Business Development at Helsinn where his responsibilities included identifying external research projects, in-licensing, new investments and setting up strategic collaborations with companies and Universities.Prior joining the Helsinn Group, Dr. De Ponti held responsibilities for in and out-licensing for Indena, a leading natural derivatives company with pharmaceutical products fighting cancer. Before that he served as Site Lead and Head of Pharmaceutical Sciences in the Oncology Italian site of Pharmacia and Pfizer which was eventually spun-off and where he brought the Pharma Science business unit to breakeven. Dr. De Ponti has held several patents covering the development and the commercialization of oncology drugs.

Dr. Werner M. Enz, CEO of Cellec Biotek, has a significant track record in the life sciences industry with blue chip international companies as well as startups. He has expertise in development, supply chain, marketing, sales and business development. He also runs his own consultancy business. Dr. Enz holds a Doctorate in Medicine from the University of Berne, Switzerland, and an MBA from Edinburgh Business School, UK.

Dr. Heidrun Flaadt studied Biology at the University of Constance where she also completed her PhD.
After her postdoctoral studies at Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris she attended Management Education in Zurich. She then served as COO of Diagene, a spin-off company at University of Basel. During that time the company completed the first capital round. Driven by her interest for Technology Transfer she took over a position at the Office of Technology Transfer (OTT) at the University of Basel. In 2005 she started to build up a new OTT at EMPA in Duebendorf which she headed until end of 2007. In 2008 she moved to Ticino to join her husband and received a mandate from the Università della Svizzera italiana in Lugano to create new Executive Programs in the field of Bio- and MedTech Entrepreneurship. Among others, she developed and implemented both BioBusiness and MedTech Business program. Heidrun Flaadt is now the director of CASE BioMed, Center of Advanced Studies on Entrepreneurship in Biomedicine at USI.

Andrea Maria Giori is Director of Research & Development Department of the Italian subsidiaries of IBSA Group, a multinational pharmaceutical company headquartered in Switzerland. He is responsible for new products development and deals with medical devices, supplements, drugs and cosmetics, from the early stages (feasibility study) to the first industrial production. Soft gelatine capsules, pre-filled syringes, patches and orodispersible films are the main dosage forms used in IBSA products.
Dr. Giori also coordinates the regulatory activity of the Italian Group, both for current products portfolio and new products pipeline.
He is an organic chemist with a significant experience in herbal remedies, gained as Director of Phytochemical R&D at Indena, market leader company in the production of active ingredients derived from plants and used in drugs, food and cosmetics.
Author of several publications and international patents, A.M. Giori is an invited speaker in many universities.

Peter Harboe-Schmidt, MSc, MBA (IMD) brings a wealth of start-up and industry experience from small and large biotech companies. He was co-founder and acting CEO of Xigen Pharma. He was previously head of Business Development at Modex Therapeutics, playing a key role for its IPO on the Swiss Stock exchange. Prior to this, he was Head of Market Research and Business Planning with Amgen Europe where he led a pan-European market research organization. Before that he worked in various managerial positions with DuPont de Nemours in manufacturing, sales and Business Development. As a CTI Startup coach, he has coached the founders and CEOs of over 15 Swiss life science companies.

Frank Langlotz studied Mechanical Engineering at Ruhr University in Bochum, Germany and obtained a Ph.D. degree in Biomedical Engineering in 1998 from the University of Bern, Switzerland. For his Ph.D. thesis he developed one of the world's first computer assisted navigation systems for spinal and hip surgery. Between 1998 and 2006 he was heading a research group at University of Bern that focussed on cumputerized assistive systems for surgical planning and execution.
Between 2006 and 2013 Frank was working as a patent expert at the Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property (IPI) in Bern, Switzerland, and since June 2013 he is heading a team of patent experts at IPI.

Building from a robust scientific and technical background, Shreefal Mehta has successfully translated science into commercial products.
Shreefal's skills in commercializing technology have led to success in various projects-from the market planning and launch of a multimillion dollar analytical product for the petrochemical industry to the founding of a drug discovery company and its merger with a public biotech in Australia.
His skills in managing advanced technologies led to his appointment as Executive Director of the radical innovation research program at the Lally School of Management, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He also led a consultancy project for technology-based economic development planning.
He has lectured at international conferences, been quoted in business and trade magazines (Economist, The Scientist, etc), been widely published in leading journals like Nature Biotechnology, and has taught executive management and multi-disciplinary classes on commercializing biotechnology.
He currently consults on new ventures, strategic commercialization planning for hi-tech products, analyses of product development and value propositions over the healthcare value chain, integration of company operations across time zones, and global sourcing of technology, capital, and services.
He was awarded the New York capital region's Future Business Leaders '40 under 40' Award.
He is author of the book "Commercializing successful Biomedical Technologies". Nature Biotechnology calls it "The Bioentrepreneur's Road map" that develops a seven-stage framework and does an excellent job of identifying and organizing the major issues.

Dr. Sabine Nieba is a medical device regulatory affairs and quality management professional working as a Senior Consultant at confinis ag in the area of medical devices, in-vitro diagnostics and combination products since 2012. Before she was Head of Regulatory Affairs and Quality Assurance and member of the executive board at SenTec AG, a medium sized medical device manufacturer of patient monitoring systems. From 1997 to 2004 she worked in various positions in device development and technical documentation an Metrohm AG, a manufacturer of devices for ion analytics. Sabine Nieba studied Chemistry and Biochemistry and obtained her Ph.D. from the University of Zürich (Department of Biochemistry).

Lutz-P. Nolte is professor for Surgical Technology and Biomechanics at the University of Bern, Switzerland. He received the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees from the Ruhr-University Bochum, Germany, in 1980 and 1983 respectively. During 1984-87 he headed the Nonlinear Shell Research Group at the Institute of Mechanics of the Ruhr-University Bochum, working in the field of elastic and elasto-plastic deformations of thin-walled engineering structures. From 1987 to 1990 he established the Orthopaedic Research Group at the Ruhr-University Bochum focusing his work on spinal biomechanics. In 1990, Dr. Nolte joined the Bioengineering Center at Wayne State University in Detroit, MI, USA, as an Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering. In collaboration with the Department of Neurosurgery he extended the scope of his research to computer aided surgery. In 1993, he took over the Orthopaedic Biomechanics Division at the MEM Institute for Biomechanics in Bern. Since 2001 Dr. Nolte has been the co-director of the Swiss National Center for Competence in Research "Computer Aided and Image Guided Medical Interventions" (www.co-me.ch) located at the ETH Zurich. In 2002, he became the co-director of the MEM Research Center for Orthopaedic Surgery and the director of the Institute for Surgical Technology and Biomechanics at the Medical Faculty of the University of Bern. In 2001, Professor Nolte joined the Swiss Confederations's Innovation Promotion Agency CTI as a life sciences expert and then as Head of CTI Medtech Program. He is currently acting as Vice-President of CTI, heading the domain Startup & Entrepreneurship.

Lorenzo Pradella is the Co-Founder CEO&COO of GreenBone Ortho srl. Lorenzo has a degree in Biological Sciences obtained at Università degli Studi di Milano with a Ph.D. in Pharmacology. Lorenzo has more then 25 years experiences in R&D, Business Development and Venture Capital. He worked in multinational mid size companies and large corporations such as Zambon Group SpA and Cardinal Health Inc., now Catalent Inc. During such period he established different collaborations with pharmaceutical and biotech companies also based on pharmaceutical products and technologies like Drug Delivery Systems and Medical Devices. General Manager of Zcube srl (Research Venture of Zambon Group) from 2008 leveraged to company to a global leader in translational medicine through collaborations and investments with universities in Europe, United States and Israel, as well as with Mission Bay Capital and the California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3), which is headquartered on the UCSF Mission Bay campus. Part of the syndicate during SuppreMol GmbH acquisition by Baxter International Inc. for EUR 200 million (March 4, 2015). Member of ETPN Executive Board (European Technology Platform on Nanomedicine), President of Italy HealthCare Licensing Group (ItalyHLG) 2010-2014 and Honorary President of the Business Development Academy since 2014.

Michael Röttcher works as Senior Project Manager at Zühlke Engineering AG since 2008 and manages the competence center for medical engineering. Prior he moved back to Zühlke, Michael managed a development department at SKF MCI Medical since 2006 and was lecturer at the Institute for Medical and Analytical Technologies at the School of Life Sciences in Basel (CH). From 1999 to 2005 he worked at Zühlke Engineering AG managing technical projects in the fields of Pharma and Medical. In 1993 he started at Ciba Geigy AG (today Novartis AG) as developer and project manager in the field of lab and process automation. Michael Röttcher studied Mechatronics at the De Montfort University, Leicester (GB) and Feinwerktechnik at Fachhochschule Furtwangen (D).

Dr. Thomas Seeger, born 1957 in Wiesbaden, Germany, is one of the founders and the Managing Director of Medalliance Consulting. He has worked in the area of reimbursement marketing for more than 20 years, a concept that he developed to a great extent. Thomas has long-standing international experience in sales and marketing of medical devices and an in-depth knowledge of the markets and reimbursement structures of the health care systems of Germany, Switzerland and Austria. He is specialized in analyzing the market and funding situation specific to a client's technologies, developing tailored reimbursement and pricing strategies and helping implement these at provider, payer or patient level.

Prof. Nikolaos Stergiopolus is professor at the EPFL and the director of the Laboratory of Hemodynamics and Cardiovascular Technology (LHCT), a leading laboratory in the study of blood flow in relation to cardiovascular disease. He is the founder and director of Antlia S.A. and of Rheon Medical SA as well as the founder and scientific director of EndoArt S.A.

Gábor Székely graduated in chemical engineering and in applied mathematics.
He obtained his Ph.D. in analytical chemistry in 1985. He joined the Computer Vision Laboratory of the ETH Zürich in 1991, where he is currently full professor for medical image analysis and visualization and heading the biomedical image computing group. In 2007 he co-founded the start-up company Virtamed and is still serving on its Board. Since 2010 he is member of CTI and currently Head of MedTech activities.

Dr. Anna Tampieri is a research Manager at the National Research Council of Italy and the coordinator of the Research Group of Bioceramics and Bio-hybrid Composites since 1996. She is the author of about 200 scientific papers and inventor of 16 patents. She is also the coordinator of National and European projects. In addition she was the founder of the spin-off company Finceramica Biomedical Solution SpA in 1995, then the CEO and presently she leads the Scientific Advisory Board. She was awarded with “Marisa Bellisario” prize by Confindustria Italia for leading significant advances in material science, biomedical field. She is teaching in several Universities and is tutor of several Ms.C and Ph.D students. She was the organizer of an International Symposia on biomaterials and the Chair of the International Conference on Biomaterials, “MiMe”, 2011, Italy. Since 2011 she is a Senior Member of the Research Institute of the Methodist Hospital, Houston, Texas, USA, as consultant for Materials Science applied to Regenerative Medicine. She is also the winner of the “Innovation Special Price”, conferred by Swisse Embassy in the ambit of Working Capital – National Prize for Innovation, 2011. She is the editor of a book on the recent advances in material science for new biomimetic materials.

Mechanical engineer by training, who specialized in Robotics, Franziska Ullrich has focused on robot-assisted minimally invasive ophthalmic interventions throughout her doctoral studies at ETH Zurich. She has authored numerous publications that focus on the development of cutting-edge technology for ophthalmic interventions. For her work, she has received multiple awards and made it onto the prestigious Forbes "30 under 30" list (Europe). Franziska Ullrich has gained practical experience in several international high-tech industries and research laboratories in Switzerland, Sweden, Australia and China. As CEO and co-founder of Ophthorobotics AG, she is highly passionate about the development and commercialization of the first system capable of performing a complete ophthalmic surgical procedure.

Stephan Wehrli is Investment Principal at Zühlke Ventures AG and has worked for Zühlke since 2013. Before he moved to Zühlke Ventures in 2017, he was Business Unit Manager and Business Solution Manager in the Software Development Department of Zühlke Engineering AG. He worked mainly with enterprise customers from a variety of industries and was responsible for shaping the offering “Rent a Startup” which enables larger enterprises to explore innovative ideas. In 2006 Mr. Wehrli graduated from Zurich University of Applied Science as Bachelor of Engineering FH in Information Technology. Thereafter he worked for IBM Switzerland before pursuing his MBA from Hult International Business School in London, Shanghai and Boston in 2012.

Christoph Wellinger is a Partner serving in the Ernst & Young (EY) Life Science Advisory practice. He started his career at Ciba-Geigy where he worked for 8 years in different line-, and global project functions. From there he moved into Management Consulting specializing in business transformation working with small-, medium-, and large Life Sciences-companies for more than 21 years. His rich understanding of Organization-, Process-, Data- and IT-integration across business functions is instrumental to define operating models that optimally fit company needs in its individual life stage(s). Chris has a proven track record in improving companies performance from startup through to large scale players. Chris holds degrees in Product Engineering, International Marketing and also studied at the University of St. Gallen where he obtained an executive MBA degree in Business Engineering.

Franz Wittwer is a biomedical scientist and intellectual property (IP)/innovation manager who has worked in the healthcare industry for more than 10 years. He currently is a senior innovation manager at Biotronik, a global medical device company. He is responsible for managing Biotronik's IP/innovation pipeline and ensuring the alignment of IP and innovation management.
From 2004 to 2005, Franz was leading a research project at Daniolabs Ltd., a spin-out of the University of Cambridge. From 2006 to 2009, he was an IP manager at NHS Innovations London Ltd. (NHSIL). In 2009, Franz joined Biotronik and held different positions in strategic IP management and product management (marketing) before accepting his current position in innovation management. Franz has a PhD in molecular biology (University of Zurich), an MSc in IP management (Queen Mary University of London), and an MBA (University of Warwick).

Juerg Zuercher's 22-year career with Ernst & Young has involved extensive audit and corporate finance experience with local and international health sciences clients.
His experience of having worked with Ernst & Young in the United States has helped him to also successfully transition clients to International Reporting Standards (IFRS or U.S. GAAP).
He is now the partner responsible for the Ernst & Young biotech practice in EMEIA (Europe, Middle East, India and Africa) and a member of the Ernst & Young Global Biotechnology Advisory Panel.
In addition to serving as an audit partner to several venture capital companies, Juerg Zuercher is also active in the VC community, advising clients on fundraising opportunities and facilitating mergers.
His rich understanding of the biotech market in the region was instrumental in providing the Swiss federal government with an in-depth analysis of the state of biotechnology in Switzerland and the launch of the 1st Swiss Biotechnology Report in March 2004.
Juerg Zuercher studied at the University of St. Gallen, where he obtained a degree in Business Administration, with focus on auditing.