The Right Kind Of Obsession: How Passion Fuels Meaningful Change With Vicky Demas
Disclaimer: While we use the word “addiction” here, we don’t mean it in a negative way. We do understand the negative connotation of the word itself. We apologize and recommend skipping this episode if the word is triggering for you.
We all have obsessions, but are yours helping or hindering you? Discover the power of embracing the right kind of addiction—one that fuels your growth, empowers your journey, and elevates your life. In this episode, Asmita Puri engages in a captivating conversation with Vicky Demas, the visionary CEO of identifeye HEALTH. Vicky shares how her lifelong addiction to learning and problem-solving has driven her journey in healthcare technology. Get ready to be captivated as Vicky shares key moments from her early passion for space and engineering to her groundbreaking work in AI healthcare. Don't miss this inspiring conversation – tune in now and unlock the potential of your positive addictions!
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The Right Kind Of Obsession: How Passion Fuels Meaningful Change With Vicky Demas
I am so thrilled to kick off season two with you. This season, we're switching things up a bit with the new episode dropping every month, which means you'll have time to really soak in each conversation. Now, real talk, though, these episodes were recorded toward the end of 2024, but you know how it goes. Life, work, dogs, the whole beautiful mess. We're finally hitting publish and bringing these powerful stories into the world. Honestly, they have aged like fine wine.
To kick of this season, we're starting with a conversation with the incredible Vicky Demas, Founder, CEO, and Board Director atidentifeye HEALTH. Before we dive into this conversation, though, one quick note. There are moments in this episode where phrases like the right kind of addiction or addicted to learning are used. I realized that kind of language can be a bit flippant, especially for folks who have experienced addiction or are in recovery. I just want to acknowledge that and thank you for giving me grace as I grow right alongside these conversations. Alright, with that out of the way, let's get into it. Here's my conversation, like I said, with the incredible Vicky Demas.
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Welcome to Beyond the Binary. For the people who are new here, this is a show about women's voices in tech. I have Vicky Demas here. She is the CEO of identifeye HEALTH. Do you mind introducing yourself to the audience?
Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here. As you mentioned, my name is Vicky Demas. I am the CEO of identifeye HEALTH. I am excited to have spent the majority of my career building tools, products, and platforms to help medical researchers and clinicians help patients. I’m very excited to be here to share a little bit of my story with you and your audience.
Vicky’s Career Journey
Thank you for taking the time to do this. You've spent twenty years in tech. It's very fascinating to me and I can't wait to get into it. Can you take us back to the beginning of your career? What were your initial aspirations when you first chose to pursue a degree in chemical engineering?
First of all, I decided I wanted to become an engineer, broadly speaking, because I love building things. I grew up with my father who I adored. He was an engineer. He was also a musician but that's a different story. He told me that you can take what might seem like an interesting component and build more complicated things that have functionality and that can be fun and exciting.
I also decided after a visit to the Kennedy Space Center at a young age. I had come as a ten-year-old to visit my uncle who lived in the States and we went. I fell in love with the concept of space exploration. I started obsessing about becoming an astronaut, reading about astronaut bios and decided that I would need a PhD eventually in engineering or science to be able to apply to be a mission specialist. The reason specifically for chemical engineering was I loved math and chemistry.
You prioritize math and chemistry, which I hear you. I loved it. My parents were like, “Not enough money to be made in chemicals, so no.” I hear your fascination with space. I can imagine a ten-year-old going there and being like, “This is my life now.” What ended up being the pivot?
It's funny because there was a much deeper thought than I liked chemistry and math. When I'm thinking about chemical engineering, it makes sense because those are two of the core subjects. What was interesting was that the whole mission specialist and becoming an astronaut was in the back of my mind, and then little things would happen. I'm a person who also believes in happenstance.
One of my first jobs was being a research technician at a small engineering consulting firm that was trying to get into R&D. They ended up getting a contract with NASA. Somehow I ended up working on this project, whose PI resigned within two weeks. The president of the company called me into his office and said. “I hear great things about you. You're the only person that knows about this. I was seventeen, by the way. He was like, “Tell me what you need to run this project.”
How did you react? Take me back to that seventeen-year-old who has so much power in her hands at that moment. How did it feel?
It was incredible and I feel like I've been very lucky in life. Even in those two weeks, I have gotten to know a lot about the project. I started getting excited. I started thinking of the next steps and what we needed to do. There was a moment of like, “Oh, my God. Do you mean me?” On the other hand, I think the main reaction was I am excited to keep this going. I'm so relieved that the project isn't going to disappear. I went into solution mode and tried to figure out what I think needs to happen and who we need in the team to make sure we can deliver on the project.
Navigating Transitions
That is an amazing story. I need to get back to your career because my ADHD is like, “That's so fascinating. You were seventeen. Tell me more.” Let's get back to your career. You started with chemical engineering, then you went into physical chemistry, and today you're in healthcare. Tell me or touch a little bit, or as much as you are comfortable, what inspired each of these transitions and how did you navigate the challenges of shifting focus?
The shifts happen naturally. It wasn't pre-planned, even though it might have appeared that it was. Here I was as a seventeen-year-old being a PI on a NASA-sponsored project. The project was studying liquid flows and solid-liquid interfaces. That was a very chemical engineering-focused project, which reinforced that I'm in the right discipline.
For my PhD, I was looking to find tools that could help me study this problem. I thought that MRI would be a very interesting potential tool. For my PhD, I joined a lab at Berkeley that was focusing on nuclear magnetic resonance, the spectroscopy version, and then the imaging component as well. I fell in love with a tool and its potential and also its applications in healthcare. That was a little bit of how that happened.
Again, realizing the potential and saying, “This is so powerful,” but it requires this multi-million dollar piece of equipment and well-trained personnel. You are confined to study only subjects that fit into the bore of the magnet. My PhD was in portable magnetic resonance. We tried to look at magnetic resonance imaging for healthcare applications, specifically in ambulatory settings. There was a failed startup that we tried to do, and then I got super lucky again with joining a startup in Boston that was looking to leverage magnetic resonance as the core platform to build a new diagnostic.
I joined the company and I started focusing on building the detector of the system and helping develop the platform. I then ended up doing all kinds of different things. The very important part was as we were building this, and we had selected our first application, we were running our pivotal study for a De Novo submission to the FDA. I remember the day that we learned that we had helped save a patient's life. We were focusing on infectious disease and the standard of care would have waited for 3 to 5 days for blood culture to come back and the person would have become septic and died. That was when I realized that I had found my passion. I want to stay in healthcare and do this for a living.
How did that come to identifeye HEALTH?
There have been a few things. I was at a startup. I got recruited. I go back to my luck and a lot of great things happening. I have found my passion for building tools, products, etc. in the healthcare space. I got recruited by Google when they were trying to explore leveraging the infrastructure that makes Google solve problems worth solving. It was within Google X, specifically in life sciences and healthcare. That was working with industry experts and building teams.
We had a ton of fun working on a lot of different projects. One of them was a collaboration that we started with Google that ended up becoming Verily because we built the Google Life Sciences that spun out during the Alphabet restructure. That got rebranded to Verily. We set up a collaboration between Verily Google and then Nikon Optos.
I started learning more about the retina and the power of the retina at the time. I was fascinated by the potential. The project that we started there definitely set the space app for the sort of AI in retinal imaging and the potential there, but things didn't quite move in the direction that one would have expected. It makes sense when you are thinking that it was early on and you have players who are very used to staying within specific lanes. There were a series of other projects.
Big corporation limitations.
Exactly. We had a lot of other fun projects at the interface, as I said leveraging AI and automation. I went on and followed Jeff Huber at Grail. I was very grateful that I got to experience working and building with a wonderful team at Cancer Diagnostic that I hope will change how we treat cancer and how we think of cancer in the future. About three and a half years ago, I got contacted by Jonathan Rothberg who is a serial tech entrepreneur and he had a company named Tesseract at the time, like the fourth-dimensional.
Jonathan was telling me about his vision and where the fourth dimension came from. You have a 2D fondest image, you have OCT for getting the depth of the retina, and you're adding molecular imaging. You do all of the things. I believed in the space and at the time, I felt good about my ability to come in and try to help maybe do a little bit of a reset to figure out what the company should be doing. How do we enable the space? I was very surprised at the time to also see that in the time that I had left Google and my time at Grail, the space had not progressed despite the fact that there was a ton of competition.
I was super excited, thinking that I could leverage a lot of my learnings and experiences from past life to enable a space that I felt super strongly about. Jonathan is very charismatic. He is a well-known entrepreneur. There were some amazing investors involved in that product too. Me coming in, refocusing, and rebranding Tesseract to identify health as we are today.
It’s fascinating all the turns and everything that led to this moment. I can hear the passion. I can hear the love that you have for the field and healthcare in general. I'm also thinking of the ten-year-old looking to be in the world of space. Did that ten-year-old every now and then come up like, “What are we doing?”
I do feel very content with where I am. I believe that life is a journey. I wouldn't have ended up here had it not been for that ten-year-old's excitement about space exploration and assessing. There is a part of me that says, “What are we building?” Because it's so easy and eventually, some of the folks we have for the platform we're thinking I can actually make it to space.
Demystifying AI
You heard it here, folks. It was such a beautiful full-circle moment. I love that. Everyone in tech where all using AI and it is the Cloud of our day. You know how in 2011 and 2012, everyone was like, “To the Cloud,” and not a lot of people understood what that meant, but everyone wanted to do it. How do you think you make AI or you use it such that everyday human beings, or the people that might not be coders or programmers would understand what is happening, or is the technology obfuscated enough for the people to not know how AI is being used?
It is the latter. I feel right now where we are with AI, it's all about using AI to automate tasks. We understand that at the first level. It makes everything seemingly so simple to run something that is usually super complex. That task can be executed pretty much by anyone. The first product will be very focused, I always feel like I have to add the disclaimer that we are building medical devices so we will work with the regulators and make sure we make the proper claims. The vision here is to make, for example, retinal imaging, which is super powerful, I call it ubiquitous.
When it comes to healthcare, I think that in tech and software companies, lives are not involved. People can make whatever claims they want to make and everything is all good. It's good that you are already cognizant of the limitations and boundaries and things that are put out and making sure it's tested to the nth degree because it's healthcare and there are different standards. I love hearing that.
Before I go to my next question, the thought came up. You mentioned luck quite frequently. I do want to add that while luck might have something to do with it here and there, I do want to say that you sound like a very motivated and hardworking individual. I'm going to push back on the luck a little bit if that's okay.
That is true. I'll clarify a little. Luck is an important ingredient but not sufficient. I feel if you were to ask me what has been my background, I would say being passionate and having grit, perseverance, and dedication. I'm not just giving up. If I feel like something needs to happen, I will make it happen. That has always been there, but I also do feel that luck is always an important element, even in how you make decisions sometimes, based on the opportunities in front of you, and the people you end up meeting.
What do you think is the driving force for that grit? Where does that come from for you?
Once I find a focus, a problem worth solving, or something I feel passionate about, it gives me that perseverance, like what it takes to stick to it until I see it through, maybe even sometimes to a fault. I think that's my personality.
Obsession: Once I find a focus, a problem worth solving, it gives me the perseverance to speak to it until I see it through—maybe even sometimes to a fault.
You are solving big problems in healthcare. I don't know if I can see that as a problem.
Thank you.
Changing Goals And Vision
When you first began your career, did you envision yourself in the position that you are in today? We slightly touched on this with the ten-year-old. How have your goals or your vision for your career changed over time?
As you're guessing from the story so far, I did not at all envision that one day I would be the CEO of a tech startup in healthcare, nor did I seek it. I'll add that as well. A lot of it, again, I go back to the element of luck more in terms of the happenstance situation. The part that was pivotal has always been up until that moment with the startup. The name of the startup was T2 Biosystems. I got to see the impact you can potentially make on the patients themselves, their lives, and the outcome for their family and friends.
Up until that point, I had the passion. I would do the next best thing and try to do the best that I can. From that moment on, I knew that was the constant driver. That never changed. It hadn't changed in the last twenty years. What was changing over time was more appreciating potentially the type of impact you can make as you shift through your career, which for me, again, happened very organically. It wasn't pre-planned like, “You spend X number of years being an engineer and then you become a technical lead.” It was that things just happen.
I join a startup to solve a technical problem. There are all these other issues related to automating parts that have nothing to do with my technical expertise. You learn more technical things and you learn from the people around you how to be a problem solver in a bigger space. Guess what? We're a startup. We don't have the right processes. How do I learn that?
Google, think of it as being at an incubator. You started solving problems at different scales and stepping into different roles. I then found myself with the same vision, goals, and aspirations, helping people, making an impact, and making contributions to changing potentially the scale of the contribution that I can make based on the different experiences and skillsets.
Not trying to compare it to drugs, but I can't think of another word because English is my second language. Sometimes it fails me, but it sounds like the high that you got from impacting someone's life, especially when you're talking about helping someone with an infectious disease and things like that, where you could potentially change the trajectory of their lives. It sounds like getting that high and wanting that feeling again, and that being the driving force to a certain extent.
Don't worry. English is my second language too. I know exactly what you mean.
Key Themes And Patterns
I guess this this is sort of transitioning into the next part too. When you look back at your career journey so far, what are the key themes or patterns that stand out to you other than grit, the driving force, and the luck aspect of it, which I'm pushing back on? Is there anything?
In addition to the grit, I'm not trying to put myself down at all by speaking of luck, but people are important. The one thing that has also been very consistent to me is building strong relationships and working with people you enjoy working with, you respect. You tend to seek to work with people you've worked with before so that you can be aligned with the same goals. We're here to make an impact. We're working with people we like, and that's also one of the things that is cool about my job now. It is that I've been able to come in and think through what we need to do.
We built an amazing team and we continue to build an amazing team so that we can solve problems worth solving with people we enjoy spending time with. The problems are so hard. You don't want to add more complications unnecessarily and work is such a big integral part of our lives, and the time we spend that we want to be surrounded by great people.
Work is such a big integral part of our lives and the time we spend that we want to be surrounded by truly great people.
That is a very good point, keeping being the people. We do that in our life, in general. We try to surround ourselves and we try to build a community with people who fill our buckets with the joy or the things that we need to fight or go through life because it's hard. I'm not part of work people like that, but surrounding yourself with the same community of people that you do in your regular day-to-day life.
That's an interesting aspect of it. When do you think that happened to you? When did it click like, “I need to focus on building relationships?” It’s like, “These are the people that I like and that I enjoy working with.” It's not that you avoid other kinds of people, but you're not going to start a company with anyone.
In the earlier stages of this, learning is a big part, especially as you're switching fields. We're switching continents, countries, etc. as well. You have to learn how to find information to stand up on your feet and to start solving problems. It started as more of a source of information and support, and then you tend to instinctively reach out to people who say yes, and give you the support. They're kind and collaborative.
It started as that. Over time, as I got to build teams, I got to be a little bit more mindful because it's different if you are part of a team that someone else has built. You don't get to help us much building the team versus now, as you grow, you start to see the impact of being surrounded or having a couple of people who keep that in mind, like the collaboration, the respect, and the being supportive of each other. These are some of our values that identify. You get to see the impact. There's a ripple effect and running your own startup, you get to make that a big focus of how you build a team. It's been a fun thing to watch and experience. I’m very grateful I get to do that.
Do you make sure that while you're collaborating with people and like-minded people, you're also incorporating different opinions, diverse opinions, and a diversity of experiences?
Thank you for saying that because I want to make sure that we clarify. I'm speaking about values and building a culture. Something that I'm very proud of is the diversity we have at identifeye, and it happened naturally. If you were going and you say, “I want people who are here because they believe in our mission,” they want to help patients. I want to make sure that the way we make decisions is based on data from an engineer, obviously, some assumptions because we're a startup. We don't always have all the data, but we're very open.
It's not personal like his opinion versus her opinion versus mine. It's more like we all came in and we are collecting data. We're making the best decision we can, and we all get behind and support it. We're focused on executing that. We're also supporting each other. That is how we think about what our culture is.
Having diverse opinions and having disagreements in a respectful way so that we can come back to the best conclusion is for sure an integral part. I’m very happy in our space. We are 30% female. We have a fully international group and it is something that I'm very happy to say when we ask the team and in our polls, etc. Do you feel that diverse opinions are valued? That is something that the team feels very strongly about.
Having diverse opinions and disagreements in a respectful way is key to reaching the best conclusions.
I was trying to make sure that we clarified that. When tech or any industry says like-minded people, that gets interpreted in different ways. I did hear you say that it comes from values. It comes from the value of solving a problem that you care about, the problem that we're trying to solve, and you're collaborative and supported. I did hear that.
That's why I was like let's clarify because that phrase of like-minded people brings up preconceived notions. We’re not naming names, but there are lots of people in tech where like-minded people meant like-looking people and like experiences, and not like-minded people or people who had similar values or were just kind, compassionate, and collaborative.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to clarify because I want to make sure that makes it across.
Mentorship And Advice
As someone who has navigated multiple disciplines and achieved success in various leadership roles, how do you mentor others who are early in their careers? What's the key piece of advice that you give them or that you offer them early in their career and try to map it all out? If they're not heard, any of the conversations around you didn't map it all out, you worked through each and every problem and it created the path for you.
That doesn't take away because what I usually tell people, and I'm very open by the way to telling them don't stress about having everything figured out right at the beginning of your career. The second part of that is to do something you love because, by definition, you're going to be better at that than something you're forcing yourself.
Do something you love, do the best you can, and then build relationships. Find role models and seek mentorship. It goes back to the whole people are important, like how to learn not just from your mistakes but from the mistakes of people who are willing to share them with you. Now we're fortunate to have access to data. A lot of people sharing their bios, etc. There's a good way to learn from everyone who has come before us.
Growth Mindset
I was going to say there's another key theme or pattern that stands out to me when I talk to you. Again, I've known you for 30 minutes. There's a heavy growth mindset there. Could you speak to that a little?
If you were to speak with anyone who knows me well and has worked with me and my team now, I always remind people that we are all work in progress. As you said earlier, like the high and the addiction, I'm almost addicted to learning. I do think that's probably one of the most exciting parts of life. We continue to evolve and hopefully become better versions of ourselves. If today I’m a little bit better than I was yesterday, and I sure hope tomorrow, I'll be a little better. I will learn something, whether it is something related to how I can do my job better, or how can I be a better person or a better friend.
Learning about the growth mindset, what it means, and integrating it into my life was such a game-changer. When I see it in someone else, it's easy to understand why they are where they are because you're talking about people. You're talking about good. Your mind is seeing a problem and being like, “I want to learn more about the problem. I want to understand how to go about solving it.” I would imagine if someone is coming to you with some feedback like, “Can you talk about the diverse thing?” You're not trying to get defensive because that's not what happens with a growth mindset. You're like, “Cool, this is an opportunity, fun.” That way, you learn.
You are touching on something that I feel very strongly about, which is giving and receiving feedback I feel is an art. It's something that I tell people. No matter what feedback I get, I'm grateful for it because there's always some element there that you can take back, reflect on, and try to improve. You have to be mindful, but I feel it's an opportunity to learn, develop, and improve.
A manager of mine once said, “Any feedback in the ASK model.” I'm not the biggest fan of all the various tools and everything because I can't remember them, but the ASK one - actionable, specific, and kind feedback. I cannot Imagine, I cannot believe that I've remembered it through all these years because I'm bad at remembering things. It's been such an amazing tool. As long as you give me feedback in an actionable, specific, and kind manner, I will receive it and I will make sure I give it to you in that format. Usually, for people with a growth mindset, it lands well.
Solving Problems As A Leader
I'm curious about another piece. As you have moved to leadership roles, I would imagine the part of the problem that you're solving has changed. You're not probably writing codes to figure out the data model for the AI tool. As a CEO today, how have you dealt with that aspect of your career change?
You're thinking back to problem-solving and focusing on the most effective way to solve a problem and get to what you're trying to accomplish. In our particular case now, we want to start launching products to help patients screen. Our first product indication will be screening for diabetic neuropathy. You start to focus on triaging who's the best person to do what, and what are the different elements that are needed. It's almost like you are orchestrating pieces. That's probably one of the fun parts. That's probably similar to being a senior product manager or technical lead, etc., so specific aspects.
As the CEO, what happens is it's almost like I'm transitionally the head of whatever needs to be defined because we're going through, we are defining strategy, and we are defining what we're building. We're having the team build and test it, and make sure we are where we need to be, and all that comes to it. It's not just the technical. Its operations, quality, regulatory strategy, and all of that, then there's marketing that we need to set up. How are we going to sell this?
It's more about being adept at figuring out what's needed, trying to do as much as you can, and then finding someone who will come, take over, and do a better job at that now better-defined need, new function, and a new capability that we need to build us a team. From my perspective, it's all very organic because of how it's almost like I've been working through my life and my career, and all of these different aspects that somehow make it supernatural.
Obsession: It's about being adept at figuring out what’s needed, doing as much as you can, and then finding someone to come and do a better job at it.
Rapid Fire
Again, the hard-working part of it stands out to me, where it's a new challenge thrown at you that's probably not technical. I can imagine you going, “All right cool. This is what we need to do, and the technical part. Let's go people.” That's the way that you'll probably be solving problems. Now, we're into the rapid-fire part of things. What would you be doing if you weren't in tech and healthcare?
There will be a couple of things that won't surprise you. I want to help make an impact. Being an educator would be something natural. I care a lot about going back to the people in terms of helping shape the minds of the future or the next generation and teaching them, making sure that they are better than us, and learning from our mistakes.
Naturally, that makes sense to me. I do love my job, but this is an element of it. The other one is the whole non-profit humanitarian work that ties into my passion for figuring out how to help people, whether it is access to healthcare, food, poverty, or making sure education is more accessible. Those would be the two things that I think are related to what I'm doing that I could envision.
You mentioned your dad is a musician. Does that show up in your life at all?
I attempted in early. I enjoy music very much, but there was a reason why I wasn't more involved in music. My father did teach me how to play the guitar and I could be a studious child and I memorized things. I would memorize combinations and learn specific songs but my older brother was very talented or is very talented. He could hear a song and then automatically know how to play it on the guitar. In my head as a kid, being a little bit competitive with my brother, I was like. “I don't want to get another thing to study that he will be better at without ever putting any effort.”
My younger sister is like your older brother. She would go Mom would be like, “Do your homework,” and I would be spending hours learning things. She would go in, do her 30 minutes, all homework done, come out, and be like, “All right, all done.” I’m like, “What on earth is happening? Why?” I hear you. What is the best piece of advice you've ever received?
That's hard because I go back into the feedback. I've gotten a lot of good advice. One that I feel has been at the back is to focus on what you can control and let go of everything else.
Addiction: Focus on what you can control and let go of everything else.
That one is so hard.
I'm not saying don't try to change things because we need change, but you have to have a receptive audience. There has to be space. I don't know if you ever read the book Crucial Conversations. When you're running into a conversation, you're trying to focus on what's the best possible outcome, recognizing that the outcome depends not only on you, but the other counterparty, whether it is a colleague, a manager, or someone.
It's good advice for life in general too. When my brain goes, “I can control everything,” no, I can't. Speaking of Crucial Conversations and books, what's your favorite book or podcast?
That's a tough one because I have a ton. I think you found one other addiction of mine or obsession. I'll go anything from the classics. I'm Greek and I grew up with my favorite book or work, The Odyssey. In recent books, Thinking Fast and Slow is one of my favorites. I do love a lot of the great biographies from Walter Isaacson like Steve Jobs and The Code Breaker about Jennifer Doudna.
I know we didn't get into it too much, but I'm sure as an immigrant and as a woman in tech and healthcare, you've had your own set of challenges. What keeps you still going? I think I have an idea of the answer. Why are you still in tech?
I think tech and how I think a little bit about the fact that both progress in science and medicine, I believe is interconnected to the tools that we have available to us. Technology ever-evolving allows us to create better tools for solving important problems, helping patients, and understanding the human body, biology, and the universe. It is something that I feel has unlimited potential to change even if you wish our standards. If we can continue to change and elevate our standards of care and our standards for learning and exploring. It is addicting.
Progress in science and medicine is interconnected to the tools we have available to us. Technology, ever evolving, allows us to create better tools for solving important problems and helping patients.
That's the theme. Good kind of addiction. I can call this episode, “It’s the right kind of addiction.” Where can people find you if you want to be found?
I like being found. I love people. LinkedIn would be a great way and then also through our company website, which identifeye.health.
I love that.
Thank you. We love our name.
It's pretty neat. Dr. Vicky Demas, this is been so fun. I get too comfortable. Thank you again so much for taking the time to do this. This has been a lovely conversation. I'm feeling very motivated.
Thank you so much for having me. It was super fun. It was great to meet you. Thank you again for taking the time to learn more about my journey.
Thank you.
Important Links
Vicky Demas - LinkedIn
About Vicky Demas
Vicky Demas is the CEO of identifeye HEALTH (formerly Tesseract Health), a company leveraging AI to build a new diagnostics branch. She has over 20 years of experience building teams, developing and launching healthcare products, and establishing and managing diverse program portfolios.
Prior to joining identifeye HEALTH in 2021, Vicky led the development of new products at the cancer screening company GRAIL, where she also managed the scientific and technology portfolio and led a cross-functional competitive intelligence program. She supported the development of the core platform technology that formed the basis of the company’s first multi-cancer early detection test (Galleri) and led GRAIL’s post-diagnostic efforts.
Before joining GRAIL, she was a founding member of the Google Life Sciences (GLS) team within Google [x], later spun out to form Verily. She led several teams and projects, including in diagnostics, medical devices, and translational laboratory science, and helped build its multidisciplinary science and engineering programs, joint ventures and partnerships.
Vicky holds over 20 patents and has authored and co-authored numerous publications across multiple disciplines. She holds a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Lawrence Berkeley and Livermore National Labs.
