BOSTON– BIOMEDevice Boston, the leading industry conference for medtech design and manufacturing industries, opened yesterday with an impactful keynote from famed Theranos whistleblower, Erika Cheung. Now CEO and founder of Ethics in Entrepreneurship, Cheung reflected back on past experiences and how leaders of organizations today can learn from past circumstances and collectively challenge medtech businesses to safeguard best practices as the industry moves forward.
“This point of ethical humility, the fact that there is the capacity and capability that all of us can be in these situations … are really important,” Cheung said. “There are a lot of environments that can put pressure on us that really bend our ability to make good decisions and we deem as acceptable. We need to understand that healthcare, in particular, has a certain responsibility to be confident and be capable.”
Cheung was received by an eager audience of young and diverse entrepreneurs with a significant observable rise in this attendee demographic, as well as industry veterans through an hour follow-up Q&A session. Questions received inflected on industry obstacles such as excelling as women lead organizations, providing opportunity for diversity in ethically led businesses, and how to create change in the regulatory levels borrowing from other parallel industries.
“The key is very simple; It is being honest with people,” Cheung said. “Talking about limitations or talking about where they currently stand, both on the side of the founders…in addition to on the investment side being comfortable hearing challenges. It is going to be important to prevent a situation where there are these extreme exaggerations of what is happening in the R&D phase.”
“It was invaluable hearing Erika’s expertise and perception on how to maintain an ethical culture within the medtech community,” said Adrienne Zepeda, Group Event Director, BIOMEDevice Boston. “We appreciate her perspective through her work in Ethics in Entrepreneurship and hope having access to her at these types of events help provide investors, entrepreneurs and workers with resources to better recognize, and manage ethical issues in emerging companies.”
