team

Cristian Atria - Founder & CEO

Cristian is a healthcare entrepreneur with more than twenty years experience in product development and commercialization. He founded nView medical after a successful career with GE Healthcare where he developed and launched three major platform products, ran an acquired business in computer aided surgery, and turned around a product line from 50% decline to 30% growth. Cristian was responsible for the product launch of Fiagon’s (Berlin, Germany) navigation system in the Americas and oversaw new product development of HealthTronics’s (Austin, TX) image guided cryotherapy products. Cristian has authored more than ten patents and various publications. He holds two Masters of Science in Engineering (Centrale-Supelec in Paris, France and Politecnico di Torino in Italy), an MBA from Boston University and a certificate in Entrepreneurship from MIT. 

Cristian is passionate about innovation. He spends his free time with his family or in the outdoors climbing, mountain biking, and skiing.

Lisa Last - COO

Lisa leads the effort in bringing nView through regulatory approvals, manufacturing, and relationships with contract manufacturers.  Lisa has 13 years of experience, 11 with GE Healthcare.  She brings strong systems design, manufacturing, and regulatory experience with her to the role.  During her tenure at GE Healthcare, she was a Manufacturing Transfer Project Leader - a key role in bringing technology into production.  Lisa’s latest responsibilities with GE Healthcare included working closely with the FDA on regulatory issues and she successfully managed stop-shipment lifting for a product that was under a Consent Decree with the FDA.  Lisa and Cristian have worked together in the past, and have cleared five 510(k) products.  Lisa holds a B.S. in biomedical engineering from Boston University and a M.Sc. in engineering management from Tufts University.

Christopher von Jako, PhD - Board member

In his most recent executive position, Dr. von Jako served as President and CEO of BrainsWay from 2020 to 2023. BrainsWay (NASDAQ & TASE: BWAY), is a global leader in advanced non-invasive neurostimulation treatments for mental health disorders. At BrainsWay, he launched five key differentiated products, obtained numerous reimbursement coverages, and executed an equity investment with a follow-on raise of over $45m, composed of top-tier US MedTech investors. Prior to this, Dr. von Jako was CEO of Dynatronics (NASDAQ: DYNT), a medical device company providing restorative products to accelerate optimal health, from 2018 to 2019, where he developed a new growth strategy focused on driving sales, business development, and proactive investor relations. Before joining Dynatronics, Dr. von Jako served as President and CEO of NinePoint Medical, Inc., a medical imaging company, where he successfully secured a significant strategic investment and long-term partnership with Merit Medical Systems, Inc. He also served as President and CEO of NeuroTherm, Inc., a pain management business until its acquisition by St. Jude Medical Corporation. Earlier in his career, Dr. von Jako worked in senior executive roles of progressive responsibility with other leading medical device companies such as Integra LifeSciences, Covidien, Medtronic, and Radionics. Dr. von Jako earned a double B.S. degree from Bates College, an M.S. degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a Ph.D. degree from the University of Pécs Medical School.

Lu Zhang - Board member

Lu Zhang, Founder and Managing Partner of Fusion Fund, is a renowned Silicon Valley-based investor, a serial entrepreneur, and a Stanford Engineering alumna. With a strong technical background, Lu has extensive experience bringing a broad range of technologies to commercialization and deep domain expertise in AI in healthcare, Enterprise AI/Networks, Edge Computing, and Data Privacy. Prior to starting Fusion Fund, Lu was a serial entrepreneur and materials science researcher. Lu is a first-generation immigrant originally from Inner Mongolia. At the age of 21, she built a medical device company for Type II Diabetes diagnosis based on her graduate school research in Stanford University. Following the acquisition of her startup by a leading public medical device company, Lu began investing in and supporting early-stage entrepreneurs. This eventually led her to create Fusion Fund in 2015. Since then, Lu has built a distinguished eco system and established her reputation in the VC industry. She was honored as Young Global Leader by World Economic Forum (Davos), Silicon Valley Women of Influence, Best 25 Female early-stage investor by Business Insider, Featured Honoree of VC of Forbes 30 under 30 and Town & Country 50 Modern Swans - Entrepreneurship Influencer. Lu frequently speaks at high-profile tech conferences such as World Economic Forum(Davos), Future Investment Initiative (FII), Web Summit, SuperReturn, etc., and she is a guest lecturer at Stanford University and Wharton. Lu serves as a board member of many portfolio companies, the Board and Chairwomen of the Youth Council of Future Science Award, and Jury Board of the Cartier Women Initiative and Young Leader Award. She holds an M.S. in Materials Science and Engineering from Stanford University.

Kevin Foley, M.D. - Board member

Dr. Kevin Foley is a professor of neurosurgery, orthopedic surgery, and biomedical engineering at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center in Memphis, Tennessee. He serves as chairman of Semmes Murphey Clinic, director of complex spine surgery at Semmes Murphey, director of the spine fellowship program for the University of Tennessee Department of Neurosurgery, and medical director for the Medical Education & Research Institute.
Dr. Foley received his doctor of medicine degree from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1979. After an internship at Letterman Army Medical Center in San Francisco, he returned to UCLA in 1980 to complete his neurosurgery residency.
Following residency, Dr. Foley served in the United States Army Medical Corps as assistant chief of neurosurgery at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, chief of neurosurgery at Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu, Hawaii, and chief of neurosurgery as well as chairman of the neurosurgical residency program at Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington, D.C. In 1992, Dr. Foley left the military and joined the Semmes Murphey Clinic and the Department of Neurosurgery at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center.
In addition to a full-time surgery practice, Dr. Foley is actively involved in research in minimally invasive spine surgery, disc regeneration, image-guided spinal surgery, robotics, spinal biomechanics, and neurosurgical outcomes. He has authored more than 35 book chapters and more than 125 scientific journal publications. He is the inventor of many medical devices and biologic products and has been issued more than 150 patents by the US Patent and Trademark Office. Several of his inventions have advanced the field of minimally invasive spine surgery, to include tubular retractors, percutaneous screw fixation using detachable extenders, and tapered and expandable interbody implants. He has lectured at more than 600 scientific meetings and educational workshops and has been a visiting professor and invited lecturer at several universities in the USA and abroad. He serves on the board of directors for several medical device and biologics companies to include Discgenics, LaunchPad Medical, and Triad Life Sciences. In recognition of his achievements, Dr. Foley was honored with the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) Cushing Award for Technical Excellence and Innovation in Neurosurgery in 2019.

Frederic Noo, Ph.D. - Scientific advisor - Image reconstruction

Dr. Noo is a Tenured Professor of Radiology and Adjunct Professor of Bioengineering and Electrical & Computer Engineering at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah. Dr. Noo is an international expert in medical imaging, with strong emphasis on image reconstruction, image quality assessment and system design. His research encompasses both diagnostic CT imaging and three-dimensional cone-beam imaging in interventional radiology. To date, he has published 62 peer-reviewed papers and co-authored 98 conference proceedings. Dr. Noo regularly lectures at international conferences and actively serves as a reviewer for the NIH and for scientific journals. He is an associate editor with The IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging and is member of the editorial board of Medical Physics. He also has launched and repeatedly chaired the biennial “International Conference on Image Formation in X-ray Computed Tomography."

Tolga Tasdizen, Ph.D. - Scientific advisor - Machine learning

Professor Tasdizen’s research interests include image processing, computer vision and pattern recognition with a focus on applications in biological, and medical image analysis. He is a recipient of the National Science Foundation’s CAREER Award. He is a member of the Bio Imaging and Signal Processing Technical Committee of the IEEE Signal Processing Society and serves as an Associate Editor for the IEEE SIGN. Applying these methods to problems in biomedical imaging, particularly neural circuit reconstruction from very large-scale image datasets. Prof. Tasdizen received the B.S. degree in electrical and electronics engineering from Bogazici University, Istanbul, Turkey, in 1995. He received the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in engineering from Brown University, Providence, RI, USA, in 1997 and 2001, respectively. He joined the Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute at the University of Utah as a Post-Doctoral Researcher in 2001 where he was also a Research Assistant Professor 2004-8. Since 2008, he has been with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Utah, where he is currently an Associate Professor. He is a Utah Science Technology and Research Initiative Faculty Member with the SCI Institute.