Meet (Some) of the Team

Gregory is an executive, entrepreneur, engineer, and scientist with over 25 years of experience taking medical technologies from concept to bedside to commercialization in academic, start-up, and corporate environments. He received his BS, MS, and PhD all from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in mechanical engineering where he also did post-doctoral research and was a Staff Scientist in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology. He has worked with numerous startup companies including being the co-founder of Hemedex, the founding VP of R&D at Opsonix, and working as a consultant to many early-stage medical device companies.

Friedel is an expert in system development, system modeling, analysis, and testing, to help clients achieve their product development goals. He has over 20 years of systems development experience with The Raytheon Company advancing new technologies and executing programs from proposal through deployment in roles of increasing responsibility including as Senior Principal Engineer, Team Lead, and Product Owner. Friedel is an expert in signal processing, target detection, tracking and classification, and system and environmental modeling. He holds a B.S. in Engineering from Northeastern University and a Ph.D. in Physics from The University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

Michael received his BS and MS in Biomedical Engineering from UCONN and a PhD in Biochemistry, Molecular and Cellular Biology from the University of Arizona. His postdoctoral fellowship at Brown University provided exceptional technical value to the clinicians in the Department of Surgery at Rhode Island Hospital where he helped decipher the mechanical regulatory cues involved with immune dysregulation in diseases like Sepsis. Michael is actively connected with a broad network of global medical and life sciences professionals. He specializes in the front-end innovation aspects of product development, such as Technology Scouting, Requirements Development, and Concept Generation, demonstrating significant successes specifically within the diagnostics and life sciences sector.

Since 2005, Anna has helped academic medical centers, biotech startups, and climate tech organizations secure and manage grant funding to advance research, accelerate innovation, and drive meaningful impact for patients and the planet. She has led the development of grants and compliance programs, built cross-functional strategies, and managed complex, multi-stakeholder initiatives, delivering results on time and on budget. To date, she has submitted nearly one thousand grants, has secured hundreds of millions in funding, and has overseen post-award projects totaling more than $200M.

Xavier received his BS in Microbiology and Immunology and Psychology, his MS in Public Health, and his PhD in Cellular Physiology and Molecular Biophysics from the University of Miami. He attended Baylor College of Medicine as a Post doctoral trainee prior to opening his company, PulseLink Communications and Analytics, a freelance medical writing company. Xavier has certifications in medical writing, medical editing, and regulatory writing from the American Medical Writing Association and the Regulatory Affairs Professional Society and is a board member for the Texas chapter for both organizations. Xavier has expertise in mild cognitive impairment, Alzheimer’s disease, cerebrovascular stroke, and cardiovascular disease.

Pamela received her BS in Biochemistry from the University of New Mexico and a PhD in Cellular Molecular Pharmacology and Physiology from the University of Nevada Reno, School of Medicine. Her doctoral dissertation focused on therapeutic avenues for multiple muscular dystrophies. She provided evidence that treatment with the biological laminin-111 increases muscle regeneration in several animal models of disease. She is now a postdoc at Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School where she is developing assays for the discovery of treatments for other muscle diseases. She is also working on describing mechanisms of disease using molecular biology and bioinformatics.

Boris is an electrical engineer with over 25 years of experience in robotics systems and founder of B2 Robotics. His background includes taking military, industrial, and consumer robots from initial concept to mass production. He holds a BS from Tel-Aviv university and MS in control systems from Northeastern University. At B2 Robotics, Boris works with start up as well as Fortune 100 companies designing ground robots, underwater robots, and drones. Previously, he worked at Shield AI where he designed fully autonomous drones and prior to that, he worked at iRobot for 14 years on military and consumer products. Boris’ areas of expertise include system level architecture, FPGA design, high-speed digital design, navigation hardware and motor control.

Vicki received her BS in Biology from Roanoke College and her PhD in Cell Biology and Physiology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She continued her research career at Washington University in St. Louis as a postdoctoral scholar then as a senior scientist. In her research, Vicki specialized in developing translational endpoints for pain studies, screening novel compounds for pain, anxiety, and abuse liability, and developing a medical device to treat opioid overdose. Vicki followed her academic career with her work at the National Institutes of Neurological Disorders and Stroke as a Scientific Program Manager, collaborating with small biotech and large pharma companies, academic labs, and government researchers to evaluate their potential pain therapeutics in the Preclinical Screening Platform for Pain.

Nick Benson

 Strategic Advisor

Nick helps founders answer the most critical question in early-stage innovation: is this just a great idea, or is it a business? He operates on the principle that the best time to invent the business model and go-to-market strategy is exactly when the product is invented. As a serial innovator with a PhD in Economics and more than 30 issued patents, Nick provides the market rigor necessary to turn technical concepts into scalable leaders.

His perspective is shaped by a career turning ideas into products, managing complex M&A transactions, and scaling net-new data business models within global healthcare giants. This guidance ensures that grant-funded innovation is built with the precision required to attract strategic buyers. Nicks involvement is a selective layer for AwardIT clients who are ready to build a business that can survive the transition from bench to bedside.