Leadership
Innovative and experienced team with deep experience developing and successfully commercializing surgical and interventional cardiac devices.
John MacMahon, CEO
John MacMahon is a serial entrepreneur specializing in early stage product development. Beginning with Kerberos Proximal Solutions (acquired by Fox Hollow Technologies), He has led and/or founded numerous medical device startups in the vascular field. John was COO for Maya Medical (acquired by Covidien) and led their transfer of manufacturing from the US to Ireland. He was also the General Manager for Europe for Claret Medical (acquired by Boston Scientific). Presently, John is a Director of Cytokind and an active mentor for entrepreneurs from Stanford BioDesign, Enterprise Ireland and the Kauffman Foundation. He received his Bachelors in Physics at the University of California, Santa Cruz and graduate studies in both electrical and biomechanical engineering at Stanford University (MS EE).
Jeff Christian, Manufacturing (Phoenix DeVentures)
Jeffrey J. Christian (Jeff) is founder and CEO of Phoenix DeVentures Inc. Founded in January 2001, Phoenix DeVentures is dedicated to working with creative medical professionals, entrepreneurs, and established medical device companies to invent and develop solutions for the evolving medical device market. Collaborating with clients, Phoenix is experienced in the process of creating new concepts, tackling regulatory hurdles, developing products for emerging device markets and manufacturing for small to medium size markets. With 60 employees, Phoenix is a vertically integrated company with considerable capabilities in-house including engineering, design, manufacturing and full quality systems and services.
Prior to founding Phoenix DeVentures Inc., Mr. Christian had been with several startup companies, growing them from the garage through IPO and acquisition. With over 48 patents (inventor and co-inventor) to his credit, Mr. Christian is experienced in the process of generating and developing new products for improving healthcare.
Jeff earned a BS in engineering from Brigham Young University and completed the Stanford Executive Program in the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
John McKenna, Strategic Advisor
John is a partner at Embarcadero Financial, an RIA based in San Francisco. Earlier in his career, John helped run several firms and is familiar with successfully starting, building, and selling a business. After a move to wealth management, John worked at Citi and then Morgan Stanley as a member of one of their lead teams based in Palo Alto. John continues to create & evaluate sophisticated strategies for business & individuals.
John earned his M.B.A. from the University of California at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business. He earned a B.S. from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. John currently serves as Chair on the City of Oakland’s Budget Advisory Commission.