BRINGING HEALTHTECH TO THE PUBLIC

Dr. Irit Yaniv, MD, MBA

Founding Partner & CEO

Dr. Yaniv has more than 25 years of experience in the venture capital, pharmaceutical and biotech industries. As a senior manager, skilled physician, and experienced board member, she possesses a highly developed combination of leadership, decision making and business skills.  Dr. Yaniv has served as partner at Accelmed since 2012.  During this time she led Eximo from pre-clinical development through acquisition.

Dr. Irit Yaniv previously served as Executive Director and Chairperson of Accelmed's Innovation Hub portfolio companies. A global group of funds investing and acquiring control in HealthTech companies focused on Buyout and Non-Control transactions in commercial stage companies.

Dr. Yaniv holds an MD degree from the Ben-Gurion University and an MBA from the Recanati Business School at Tel Aviv University.

Yaron Hermeche

CFO

Yaron Hermeche brings a wide experience in the HealthTech field. Yaron is holding the position of CFO & High-Tech partner at Total Finance, a leading provider of outsourcing financial services. Prior to joining Almeda Ventures Yaron held CFO, COO & CFO positions in various High-Tech and multi-national companies.

Yaron is a certified public accountant graduated from the department of Economics in Ben-Gurion University in Beer-Sheva.

Amir Blatt

Founding Partner & CIO

Amir Blatt brings a wide experience in the HealthTech field. Prior to founding Almeda Ventures Amir was a partner at Accelmed, leading venture capital and private equity investments at HealthTech companies in Israel and in the US.

Amir graduated as a biotechnology engineer from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa and holds an MBA from the Recanati School of Management at Tel Aviv University.

Limor Sandach

Venture Advisor

Senior Executive with over 20 years of experience in investment in healthcare innovation and management of startups in medtech.

Between 2014-2019 Limor served as the CEO of AV Medical Technologies. During her tenure, AV completed product development, achieved CE & FDA approvals, and started generating sales across the globe. Following a successful partnership, AV was acquired by Medtronic at the end of 2019.

In parallel, Limor was a Partner at Access Medical Ventures (AMV), investing and serving as a director in medical devices startups.

Prior to that, Limor served at management positions in healthcare VCs – 7Healthventures, Evergreen and XT – leading due diligence and portfolio development.

Limor brings comprehensive experience of the life cycle of healthcare startups, the ability to lead and implement strategy in various stages, and hands-on experience in supporting and mentoring management to meet its goals.

Limor holds BSc in Chemical engineering and ME in industrial Design from the Technion Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel.

Tzahi Sultan

Founding Partner

Tzahi Sultan is one of the most prominent figures in the Israeli capital market.

Tzahi serves as Chairman of Discount Capital Underwriting following its merger in 2016 with Clal Finance Underwriting, the leading underwriting firm he founded more than 20 years ago, drawing on more than 25 years of underwriting experience. Under Tzahi’s leadership, Clal Finance Underwriting executed hundreds of public and private offerings, including some of the highest-profile IPOs and privatization processes in the Israeli capital market.

Tzahi is the owner and a director at Modiin Energy, a public oil and gas R&D partnership traded in the Tel Aviv stock exchange.

Prior to founding and leading Clal Finance Underwriting, Tzahi served in several senior roles, including as Managing Director at HSBC, Chief Executive Officer of Gmul Sahar Underwriters, and Head of the Underwriting Division at Poalim Capital Markets.

Tzahi holds a BA in Economics and an MBA, both are from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Dean Dudkiewicz

Analyst

Dean Dudkiewicz is a medicine student in his clinical years in the Sackler faculty of medicine, Tel Aviv.

Dr. Ori Ben-Yehuda, MD

Clinical/Medical

Ori Ben-Yehuda, MD, is a cardiologist with over 25 years experience in patient care and clinical research. Since 2013 he has served as the  Executive Director of the Clinical Trials Center (CTC) at the Cardiovascular Research Foundation (CRF) in New York where he leads a research team of 80 and directs clinical trials from first-in-human to large scale multicenter trials. He is also Professor of Medicine at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) where he is an active clinician.

Until 2011 he served as the Director of the Coronary Care Unit at UCSD Medical Center. He also served as the Deputy Editor of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology from 2002 through 2010. Dr. Ben-Yehuda is presently Editor-in-Chief of Coronary Artery Disease and Deputy Editor of Structural Heart: the Journal of the Heart Team, both peer reviewed journals. He is also the author and co-author of over 130 peer reviewed publications.

Dr. Ben-Yehuda received his medical degree magna cum laude from the Sackler School of Medicine at Tel Aviv University He completed residencies in internal medicine at the Soroka Medical Center in Beer-Sheba, Israel and New York University Medical Center. He completed his cardiology training at the  University of California, San Diego including a research fellowship in Atherosclerosis.

Joel Brill

Reimbursement

Joel V. Brill, MD FACP is an executive clinician with over 30 years of experience providing strategic leadership and medical oversight to large data-driven health organizations. He is skilled in strategy, development and implementation of innovative health programs, products and payment systems, with extensive experience in clinical practice, research, coverage, reimbursement, quality improvement, data analysis, bundled and episode payments and accountable care.  

Dr. Brill is Board Certified in Internal Medicine and Gastroenterology and works extensively with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the American Medical Association (AMA) on coding, coverage and reimbursement issues, and co-Chaired the Part D medication measures Technical Expert Panel for CMS.  He participates in the CPT Editorial Panel and the AMA RBRVS Update Committee (RUC), and has introduced over 180 CPT coding proposals. 

He has published extensively on episode and bundled payment methodologies, and has developed and submitted advanced payment models to the HHS Physician Focused Payment Model Technical Advisory Committee for consideration under MACRA.  

Dr. Michal Fisher

IP

Dr. Michal Fisher is a licensed patent attorney since 2004, Israel Patent and Trademark Office. She is also Adjunct Faculty, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Israel – Graduate course in Patent Law and Practice.

Dr. Fisher specializes in the strategic management of intellectual property portfolios, patent and trademark drafting and prosecution, infringement analysis, patentability analysis, validity and freedom to operate opinions, also patent oppositions, portfolio evaluations, clearance opinions, client pre-investment due diligence, and litigation support.

Dr. Fisher holds a B.Sc. in Chemistry (Cum Laude) from Tel Aviv University and an M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Physical and Analytical Chemistry from the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology.

Dr. Susan Alpert, PhD, MD

Regulatory

Susan Alpert, Ph.D., M.D.is specializes on the strategies needed to place medical devices and other medical products into the global market.
 

She was a Corporate Senior Vice President for Global Regulatory at Medtronic, Inc. and prior to that VP Regulatory Science at C.R. Bard, Inc. She worked at the US FDA from 1987-2000 where she held a variety of management positions in the Centers for drugs, devices and radiological health, and foods.

She was Director of the Office of Device Evaluation from 1993-1999. Susan chaired the RAPS board was on the boards of FDLI, WBL and SWHR.

Augmedics

Augmedics is developing xvision, an augmented reality system that allows surgeons to fully focus on what they see inside a patient’s anatomy without having to look away at a monitor. The system makes vital, real-time information available to the surgeon in an intuitive manner with no external distractions

Nurami

Nurami Medical is a medical device company with a proprietary nanofiber and sealant technology for soft tissue repair. The company produces durable, highly flexible patches that seal undesired leakages and enhance tissue regeneration.

BioProtect

BioProtect developed a proprietary technology platform for biodegradable balloons. The technology suits a wide range of clinical applications. The company’s first application the ProSpace Balloon System acting as a spacer for the protection of healthy tissue in patients receiving radiotherapy for prostate cancer.

TailorMed

TailorMed harnesses technology to improve the financial performance of healthcare providers and reduce the financial hardship for patients

Lumen

Lumen is a device that measures metabolism in real time and tells users whether they are burning fats or carbs and what they can do about it. Lumen also includes an application that acts as a virtual nutritionist, providing dietary and exercise recommendations based on the user's metabolism.

Virility

Virility is developing a disposable skin patch that carries an electronic module that generates neuromuscular electrical stimulation. The stimulation is delivered transcutaneously to the adjacent musculature, thus delaying the onset of the premature phase of ejaculation.