Neuro Medtech 1

Vice President
Neuromodulation Research & Development 
LivaNova

"From Foundation to Future: Advancing LivaNova’s Neuromodulation Innovation"
LivaNova has fundamentally transformed its approach to innovation. Our model is anchored in four pillars:  Talent, Culture, Governance, and Operating Model. The operating model establishes end‑to‑end accountability and ownership; governance deliberately separates “the what” (portfolio strategy and value choices) from “the how” (product development and execution) and a streamlined Product Development Process (PDP) reduces handoffs and focuses on outcomes. Together, our Innovation Community has streamlined decision‑making and strengthened alignment to the business strategy enabling us to create ingenious medical solutions that ignite patient turnarounds by delivering the right product, at the right time, and at the right cost.

LivaNova is expanding neuromodulation innovation beyond our foundation in epilepsy into obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). Our innovation roadmaps are anchored by a connected digital health platform that compounds innovation.  We’re streamlining clinician workflows and patient management end‑to‑end: Connected fleet of devices feed a secure cloud-based data platform, clinicians gain actionable insights in a unified portal, patients engage via a guided mobile app, and progressively care moves closer to home with safe, compliant remote programming.

We are leveraging agentic AI with human‑in‑the‑loop translating to speed and velocity in how we discover requirements, assure designs, generate code and tests, and maintain traceability to standards and regulatory expectations. Our innovation roadmaps anchored by a connected digital health platform, creates a compounding engine that accelerates innovation, expands access, improves outcomes, and reduces the burden on patients and clinicians

In this session, Holly will review elements of LivaNova’s innovation transformation strategy and highlight examples of their results.

Bio: Holly Grammer is an accomplished R&D technical executive with 30+ years in MedTech and currently serves as Vice President of R&D, Neuromodulation at LivaNova. Holly leads the advancement of transformative technologies that improve the lives of people living with drug‑resistant epilepsy (DRE), moderate‑to‑severe obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), and difficult‑to‑treat depression.

Across three decades, Holly has launched breakthrough technologies, scaled high‑performing organizations, and built durable innovation engines powered by accountability, ownership, and executional excellence. Holly’s leadership centers on cultivating a purpose-driven culture, empowering people, and translating bold ideas into meaningful patient impact.

Before joining LivaNova, Holly held leadership roles across the MedTech sector at J&J MedTech, Alcon, J&J Vision, and Essilor. Holly holds master’s degrees in chemistry and engineering.

CTO & EVP of Engineering
Starkey

"From Hearing Aids to Intelligent Communication and Health Companions: The Rise of AI-Powered Ear-Worn Devices"
Over 1.5 billion people worldwide live with hearing loss, making it one of the most significant and under-addressed global health challenges of our time. Beyond impaired communication, untreated hearing loss is strongly associated with increased risks of cognitive decline, depression, social isolation, and falls. Yet for decades, hearing aids have been constrained by stigma and a narrow focus on sound amplification.

This invited lecture explores how embedded sensing, ultra-low-power computing, and advances in artificial intelligence are fundamentally redefining what hearing aids can be. Once single-purpose medical devices, they are rapidly evolving into nearly invisible, always-on wearable systems that support communication, cognition, and health. Modern AI-enabled hearing devices now incorporate deep neural networks for speech enhancement and spatial awareness, seamless wireless connectivity for media and communication, and on-device intelligence for health monitoring, fall detection, language translation, conversation transcription, and personal AI assistants.

Through this evolution, hearing aids offer a compelling case study in the design of next-generation medical devices, where tight constraints on power, size, latency, privacy, and trust demand holistic system-level innovation. The talk concludes with a forward-looking perspective on how ear-worn AI platforms may shape the future of wearable health technology and human augmentation.

Bio: Dr. Achin Bhowmik is the Chief Technology Officer and Executive Vice President of Engineering at Starkey, a global leader in hearing technology, where he leads the transformation of hearing aids into multifunctional, AI-powered systems for communication, health, and personal assistance.

He also serves as an Adjunct Professor at Stanford University School of Medicine, advising research and teaching on computational perception and sensory augmentation, and is an affiliate faculty member of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence and the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute. Previously, Dr. Bhowmik was Vice President and General Manager of Perceptual Computing at Intel, where he founded RealSense and led pioneering work in 3D sensing, computer vision, and interactive systems.

Dr. Bhowmik is a Fellow of IEEE, SID, AAIA, and AIIA, and serves on the boards of RealSense, Mojo Vision, Astranu, and the National Captioning Institute, and is a member of the Biomedical Engineering Industry Advisory Board at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. He has authored more than 200 publications, including three books, and over 80 patents worldwide. His work has been recognized with numerous honors, including TIME’s Best Inventions, the Red Dot Design Award, the Artificial Intelligence Excellence Award, and the Gold Globee Award for Most Innovative Person in Healthcare.

Director, Earl E. Bakken Medical Devices Center; Bakken Professorship for Engineering in Medicine; Endowed Lions Professorship in Otolaryngology; Institute for Translational Neuroscience Scholar; Co-Director, Center for Neural Engineering; Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Otolaryngology

University of Minnesota