The 15th Annual UC Systemwide Bioengineering Symposium is being hosted this year by UC Irvine, and a fun highlight of this event is the Shark Tank competition! NPI Services, Inc., Founder and President Judy Greenspon is one of five judges selected for the Student Shark Tank competition held today, Wednesday June 18th, 2014! Business leaders are chosen to bring a real-world perspective to budding engineering entrepreneurs. Students who have passed the first round by their successful video auditions of 2-minute elevator pitches, will now present their innovative ideas to the panel of five sharks, that is, judges. Check in later in the week for an update after Judge Judy returns from the feeding frenzy!
UPDATE: The prize for the top pitch of the Student Shark Tank event is awarded to Phillip Digiglio of UC Davis!
Following the Student Shark Tank event and the afternoon symposium sessions, Plenary Speaker Joe Kiani, Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Masimo Corporation, held the audience rapt with a talk that informed and inspired, and was the exception that proved the rule that a 10-18 minute speech is optimal for great ideas. Sometimes an hour or more is way better! Creating technology to address the problems of unreliable patient monitoring, the “garage start up” of 1989 is now a publicly trading company providing its technology to top patient monitoring manufacturers worldwide. As amazing as the breakthrough in technology, however, is the path that Masimo had to travel to be today’s major award-winning entity. When disruptive technology emerges, resistance can be strong and tricky. As in most great stories, overcoming obstacles, while remaining true to good principles, eventually triumphed! The students and other attendees were captivated by Joe Kiani’s presentation, given without notes and seemingly straight from the heart.
From Masimo’s website, here are its Guiding Principles as it follows its commitment to “Improving Patient Outcomes and Reducing Cost of Care…”
- Remain faithful to your promises and responsibilities.
- Thrive on fascination and accomplishment and not on greed and power.
- Strive to make each year better than the year before both personally and for the team.
- Make each day as fun as possible.
- Do what is best for patient care.
The final point, to “do what is best for patient care,” has driven the course of Joe Kiani’s journey with Masimo. Through The Masimo Foundation for Ethics, Innovation, and Competition in Healthcare, the Patient Safety Movement is actively taking on the challenge of bringing the number of preventable patient deaths in the USA from more than 200,000 annually to ZERO. Included in their website are Resources to help you be a patient advocate for yourself or a loved one. The first Summit of the Patient Safety Movement, held in January of this year, proudly featured keynote speaker President Bill Clinton, now a citizen activist promoting important work worldwide.
Again, congratulations to the participants in the UC Systemwide Bioengineering Symposium! It has been truly a pleasure to participate in such an endeavour!