Next Level Stuff, the Exit: Part III of the Neuwave Story

In this episode, our host Dr. Bryan Hartley interviews business leader Laura King and interventional radiologist Dr. Fred Lee about growing their medical device company, NeuWave through various stages, from Series A funding to acquisition by Johnson & Johnson. This is the final installment of a three-part series about the origin, rise, and acquisition of NeuWave.

Ms. King recounts her story of joining NeuWave. While she was originally tasked with performing due diligence on behalf of investors, she found that her values and passions aligned with the company and eventually became NeuWave’s CEO. For her, the key pull factor was the company’s identity as a “platform opportunity,” since the microwave ablation device was initially used in the liver, but could also branch out and be applied to other organs and clinical scenarios. Ms. King speaks about the difference between incremental innovation and disruptive innovation. The former is more common in large established companies, while the latter is characteristic of the startup world. She credits her business knowledge to her history of working with large companies and incremental innovation in her past, which helped her in scaling up NeuWave’s disruptive innovation efforts.

Dr. Lee brings up the importance of values alignment between clinical and business leadership in a startup. He shares conversations that the leaders had regarding patient safety in the first physician uses of the device. Ms. King highlights the need to listen to early adopters and integrate their feedback into improving the product; it is this effective response that will build trust and encourage clinicians to repurchase the device in the future.

Finally, we discuss the acquisition process. Dr. Lee describes how venture capital investors brought not only funds, but more connections to the company. He compares the role of bankers in an acquisition to realtors in a property sale. They are both necessary to the sale of the asset and have experience fielding multiple offers from interested parties.

Throughout the episode, the guests highlight their continued partnership in forming Elucent, a surgical navigation company, using the lessons learned from NeuWave.