The Rise of Women Med-Tech CEOs

Thirty years ago, when I entered the medical technology finance world, female executives were as rare as a sasquatch on Madison Avenue. There was the notable exception of Guidant’s Ginger Howard who led the Vascular Intervention Division and taught me everything about atherectomy and balloon catheters. Those devices open coronary arteries blocked by bacon grease. She would go on to the CEO role at Amylin Pharmaceuticals and mentor other female med-tech executives to successful careers such as Beverly Huss who later became a med-tech CEO as well.

In those early days, the female executives were usually found in marketing or product management,  but never in the C-Suite and rarely in critical operational roles. There was one notable exception at St. Jude Medical. The company had purchased the pacemaker business from Siemens and the Ventritex implantable defibrillator business. Jane Song managed the product development and put together an engineering/development process that brought the two disparate units together; generating an amazing stream of new products that made those acquisitions a 1+1= 3 situation. Her leadership and results were amazing.

A breakthrough person in my network was Kathy Crothall, a serial entrepreneur who was competing in the diabetes market with her insulin pump taking share from market leader MiniMed. She founded and guided Animas through its successful IPO and eventual sale to Johnson & Johnson. I invested in one of the firm’s early private rounds and enjoyed watching her build a successful business. She has gone on to found yet another exciting company in the bariatrics arena.

But over the past few years, there has been a sea change as women are migrating in large numbers into the corner office. At this writing, thirty percent of the Borna Health Fund’s portfolio has a female CEO leading the effort. Some may say this change begs the question, ‘How good are they?’ 

Both the men and women CEOs are generally very good, otherwise they wouldn't have reached their positions. Both know their companies and communicate well. However, my emerging impression is that female CEOs may do two things a bit better. First, female executives seem to listen more carefully and be less anchored on their opinions than the men. And the second is that these women seem to have strong teams around them. I do not have direct knowledge on the rationale for team strength, however, I suspect that the female CEOs and their board’s recognize the importance of this vanguard group’s success. And all take extra care to ensure that the right competencies are mixed in. 

The US medical technology continues to thrive and having a larger talent pool to pull from is good for the companies and investors. The addition of women to that talent pool has broadened it significantly.