Management Team

Management Team

NewCardio has assembled an experienced and skilled management team which has proven their ability to create new products and build new enterprises.

Branislav Vajdic, PhD – CEO / Co-Founder, Board Member

Branislav is a founder of NewCardio and provides the strategic direction for the firm as its CEO. He is a proven creator of new technologies and has commercialized them into industry leading products. A 23 year veteran of Intel where he held various senior management positions including directing the Pentium & Flash memory development teams. He led a small team that designed Intel's first flash memory product and he holds several early Flash memory design patents. Branislav received a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the University of Minnesota.

Vincent J. Renz – President

Vinnie has more than 26 years of experience in the information technology industry, specifically in the development and commercialization of technology products and services. He joined NewCardio from ClinPhone, the world's leading Clinical Technology Organization which was acquired by PAREXEL International Corporation, a leading global biopharmaceutical services organization. At ClinPhone, Mr. Renz served as Chief Operating Officer. Previously, he worked for eResearch Technology, Inc. as the Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer and played a key role in building eResearch Technology's clinical technology business. Mr. Renz was also instrumental in developing the global business development and client services infrastructure to support the company's rapid growth and profitability. Mr. Renz earned an M.B.A. in Management Information Systems from Indiana University and a B.B.A. in Finance from the University of Notre Dame.

Richard Brounstein – Chief Financial Officer

Rick joined the company from Calypte Biomedical Corporation where he was CFO. Rick served as the CFO for Certicom Corporation, a wireless company. Rick was also CFO of VidaMed, Inc., a medical device company. Previous experience includes a lengthy stint at Arthur Andersen. Rick was appointed to the SEC Advisory Committee on Smaller Public Companies in 2005.

Ihor Gussak, MD, PhD, FACC – Chief Medical Officer and Vice President

Ihor is a world-recognized expert in electrocardiology and cardiac safety with five years experience with a leading CRO, eResearchTechnology, Inc. (Nasdaq: ERES) where he served as Vice President, Global Medical Affairs. He has also worked with leading pharmaceutical companies, serving as a senior executive for Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals and previously as a key executive for Aventis Pharmaceuticals Inc. Previous positions include leadership roles with the Mayo Clinic, and the ECG Core Lab at St. Louis University Health Sciences Center. He has participated in management of many clinical trials, consulted with many CROs, and is credited with major contributions and publications in the field of cardiovascular medicine. At present, he is Clinical Professor of Medicine at University of Medicine and Dentistry-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, and Executive Editor, Journal of Electrocardiology, a position he has held since 2004. He has published several textbooks and numerous peer-reviewed articles on these and other subjects in clinical cardiology. Dr. Gussak is a Fellow of the American College of Cardiology, and serves on the Clinical Cardiology Council of the American Heart Association.

Dorin Panescu, Ph.D. - Chief Technical Officer and Vice President

Dr. Panescu joined NewCardio from St. Jude Medical, Inc. (NYSE: STJ) where he most recently served as Director, Technology Development, for the Company’s Cardiac Rhythm Management Division. In this role, he managed broad functional teams tasked with the development of heart failure trending and wireless remote monitoring features for implantable cardiac defibrillators and pacemakers. Before St. Jude Medical, Inc., Dr. Panescu served as Vice President of Research and Development, Operations and Intellectual Property for Refractec, Inc., where he directed R&D and Operations for the development of keratoplasty RF ablation equipment and set the company’s IP strategy. Refractec, Inc. was the first company to get PMA approval from the FDA for the surgical treatment of presbyopia. Previously, he served as Sr. Director of Systems Development for Boston Scientific Corporation (NYSE: BSX), directing new product development for the Electrophysiology Division. Boston Scientific, Electrophysiology, is the world market leader in RF cardiac ablation systems. Dr. Panescu is credited with 130 issued U.S. patents and 70 published or pending U.S. patent applications covering a wide spectrum of technologies for medical devices, specifically related to devices and methods for medical imaging, diagnosis and therapies, as well as cardiac mapping and ablation. Dorin holds Ph.D. and M.S. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

Executive Consultants

NewCardio's Executive consultants are intimately involved with day to day activities and are spending significant portion of their time working with the Company.

Joseph Esposito, Senior Strategic Advisor

Mr. Esposito brings more than 30 years of experience managing the growth and profitability of domestic and international technology companies. For the past two years he has been providing strategic advisory services to growth companies including several of the portfolio companies at Insight Venture Partners, a private equity firm with more than $1.5 billion under management. Prior to this he was President and CEO of eResearch Technology, Inc., (Nasdaq: ERES), a leading provider of technology and services to collect, process, and distribute cardiac safety and clinical data for companies in the life sciences industry. During his tenure as President and CEO from 2001 through 2006, eResearch's market valuation grew from $27 million to a peak of $1.5 billion, receiving recognition from Fortune Magazine as the second-fastest growing company in America.

Samuel George, MD, FACC, JD – Senior Medical Consultant

Sam was formerly Director of Medical Affairs at CV Therapeutics, a cardiology faculty member and Director of the Cardiac Study Program at Duke University Medical Center, and an Established Investigator of the American Heart Association. He was also a biomedical patent attorney with Latham & Watkins LLP and is registered to practice before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. He holds M.D. from Washington University (St. Louis) and JD from Duke University.