Leadership Team
CEO
Richard Foust
Richard is an entrepreneur and investor with over 20 years of global commercial leadership experience in the healthcare industry.  He has expertise in building organizations to successfully execute GTM strategies with medical devices and digital health platforms. Richard previously worked at Abbott, Analyte Health, Honor, Velano Vascular and 3D Strategy Consulting, where he held roles in engineering, sales, marketing, and general management. He currently resides in San Francisco, CA. Richard holds a BS in Applied Physics from Emory University and MSME in Bioengineering from Georgia Institute of Technology.
Co-Founder, Chief Scientific Officer
Navzer Engineer, MD, PhD
Navzer has been instrumental in developing the Paired VNS™ technology platform. Navzer’s research in neuroplasticity and VNS laid the foundation of our stroke therapy. He has been the recipient of several grants from the NIH related to the VNS therapy and his research has been published in leading peer-reviewed journals including Nature, and The Lancet. Navzer completed his medical training in India and then earned a PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Texas at Dallas.
Co-Founder & President
Jordan Curnes, MBA
Jordan is a serial entrepreneur with expertise in building companies and recruiting successful management teams to accelerate growth. Jordan co-founded MicroTransponder in 2007 and has provided leadership during the commercialization process. Jordan previously worked at Huron Consulting Group where his clients included large healthcare corporations. Jordan holds a finance degree from Notre Dame and an MBA from Duke University.
Chief Commercial Officer
Doug Ellison
Doug has over 30 years of successful sales, marketing, new program development and executive management experience in the medical device industry encompassing minimally invasive technologies, oncology and cardiology. He most recently served as National Director, Hybrid Therapies at AtriCure post acquisition of SentreHEART. Prior to acquisition, Doug was VP of Sales at SentreHEART for 11 years. Previously, he served as VP of WW Sales and Marketing for Cardica Inc. Between acquisitions, he consulted with CardioVations, a division of Johnson and Johnson/Ethicon and Bard Biopsy System a division of C.R. Bard. He previously served as the VP of Sales at Artemis Medical, Inc., Sales Director at Heartport, Inc., and with Guidant Corp. in sales and sales management. He also served at Davol (C.R. Bard) in a variety of sales and sales management positions. Doug was instrumental in the integration of the Guidant Vascular Interventional sales forces from the Eli Lilly Corp. and development of the broad Heartport franchise. Doug received his B.S. in Engineering from Purdue University.
COO
Prashant Rawat
Prashant has over 25 years of global experience in building and leading teams to deliver novel therapies in the neurostimulation, neurovascular and cardiac fields. He previously worked at Boston Scientific, Mainstay Medical, CSF Therapeutics and CVRx. His experience spans management of research and development, clinical and regulatory operations, manufacturing and distribution, and building intellectual property portfolios. Prashant has a BS in Electronics Engineering from the Maharaja Sayajirao University in India, and a MS in Electrical Engineering and Applied Physics from Case Western Reserve University. He is the inventor on over 85 patents and patent applications.
CFO
Bunker Curnes
Bunker joined MicroTransponder with 15 years of experience in finance and operations roles in various industries. He has worked with MicroTransponder since 2011 in various roles in Finance before eventually taking over as CFO. Prior to joining MicroTransponder, Bunker worked as the CFO for HEMCO Development, an oil and gas development company. Before HEMCO, Bunker worked as CFO/COO for TEGA Technologies, an early stage tech company focused on digital marketing and communications. And prior to TEGA, Bunker worked at the Boston Consulting Group working in a variety of projects in the healthcare, energy, and retail consumer spaces. Bunker holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Notre Dame and an MBA from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University.
Vice President, Commercial Ops & Analytics
Mary Kathryn Williams
Mary Kathryn has over 15 years of medical device experience using innovative thinking and data analysis to optimize performance and support new business development. Prior to MicroTransponder, Mary Kathryn held a variety of commercial operations and sales roles at Abbott and Terumo Aortic. She holds a BS in Biology from Washington & Lee University and an MBA from Duke University.
Vice President, Clinical Affairs
Brent Tarver
Brent has 30 years of clinical expertise with vagus nerve stimulation (VNS). He was the third person hired at Cyberonics (now LivaNova) and directed 14 VNS device trials across 11 countries. Brent has been involved in more than 10 neurostimulation IDE submissions, and was very active in providing clinical input for the research program at Cyberonics during his 18-year tenure. Brent led the effort to formulate and successfully complete the pivotal US IDE trial for stroke, VNS-REHAB. Brent holds a degree in electrical engineering from Rice University.
Vice President, Market Access & Reimbursement
Spencer Bailey
Spencer is an experienced leader in Market Access and Reimbursement, with nearly 20 years in the healthcare industry.  His breadth of experience in the medical device reimbursement space comes from providing consulting services to 70 medical device clients over 7 years.  Spencer previously worked in hospital and health system administration, overseeing various reimbursement functions of small, mid-sized and large integrated health systems nationwide. Spencer holds a BS in accounting and MBA from the University of Vermont and is a Certified Professional Coder.
Vice President, Marketing
Philip Freed