Dr. Usha Thekkedath is a physician, scientist and medical device professional with more than two decades of experience in medical research and technology development in academia and medical device industry. She is currently the administrative director of Surgical Innovations at University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), and Director of Strategy and Operations, Pediatric Device Consortium, a joint program of UCSF and Stanford University, California, USA.

Previously, she has held senior scientist, project manager and director/VP positions in medical device industry, in addition to research and administrative positions at University of Utah and Houston Methodist Research Institute, Texas Medical Center, USA. She has served as advisor to research and product development programs of several institutions in India. She was one of the main contributors for developing Kerala Medical Technology Consortium (KMTC), a futuristic and highly ambitious initiative of the Government of Kerala, India, envisioning to create an ecosystem to foster medical innovation, R&D, technology development entrepreneurship and manufacturing over the next decade.

Dr. Thekkedath has a medical degree with experience in clinical pediatrics as well as in basic, clinical and translational research and whole life cycle of medical product development, from lab to market. She has expertise in project management, strategic planning, fundraising, clinical trials, regulatory affairs, research administration and business development. Her R&D experience covers medical devices and diagnostics, drug delivery systems, drug-device combination products and bioartificial organs for various medical specialties including Hematology, Nephrology, Oncology, Infectious Diseases, Regenerative Medicine, Cardiovascular, and Nanomedicine.

Dr. Thekkedath's contributions particularly in the development of Aggredyne, a point of care diagnostic device to measure platelet activity in whole blood and help cardiologists for personalized application of antiplatelet therapy, the Concentrated Autologous Platelet System (CAPS), which enables harvesting growth factor rich platelets from whole blood within a few minutes and Nanogland, an innovative nanoencapsulation system for the transplantation of pancreatic islets and stem cells are noteworthy. She also has significant experience in developing and facilitating global multi-institutional collaborative programs. She has mentored many students and trainees in medical research and technology development as well as co-authored several publications.