Physicians Interactive Holdings Inc. (PI), the leading provider of online and mobile clinical resources and solutions for healthcare professionals, today announced the addition of John de Souza, the CEO and founder of MedHelp, the largest online health community and health application site, to its Board of Directors.
de Souza is a former Vice President at Goldman Sachs, where he managed the Technology Practice of the global investment banking and securities firm’s Private Equity Group. Earlier in his career, he was the co-founder and director of Smartleaf, a financial software company, and co-founder of Flash Communications, an Internet company that developed a real-time two-way messaging system.
As a researcher, de Souza worked on guidance systems for robotic surgery at IBM’s Thomas J. Watson Research Center, virtual reality systems for NASA’s Neurolab Space Project and tools for laparoscopic surgery at the University of Tokyo.
“John de Souza brings an impressive record on global healthcare innovation and investment to the Physicians Interactive Board,” said Donato Tramuto, CEO and Chairman of the Board at Physicians Interactive. “Throughout his career, John has worked on developing and bringing to market some of the most innovative solutions in healthcare today. His extensive market knowledge will help Physicians Interactive to continue to provide the very best innovative solutions for life science clients and healthcare professionals to improve the overall well-being and outcomes for patients. We look forward to John’s contributions as Physicians Interactive continues to grow and expand.”
The addition of de Souza to the Physicians Interactive board follows the recent acquisition of PI by the Merck Global Health Innovation Fund (GHIF), a growth venture capital organization that invests in breakthrough healthcare solutions. He joins several esteemed and accomplished global healthcare innovation experts on the board, including:
- Bill Taranto, the Vice Chairman of PI’s Board of Directors, is the managing director of GHIF, which deploys its evergreen $500 million fund to rapidly identify and develop transformative global health care opportunities in pharmaceuticals and vaccines.
- George Abercrombie, the former CEO of Roche Pharmaceuticals, has more than 30 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry.
- Tim Heady is former CEO of UnitedHealth Group’s Pharmaceutical Division.
- Stan Kachnowski is a Professor at the Indian Institute of Technology in New Delhi and Chair of HITLAB, a healthcare innovation lab.
- Kerry Kennedy is the President of the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights and a board member of Health eVillages, which provides mobile health technology and medical content to rural healthcare providers in some of the most challenging clinical environments around the globe.
- Lee Shapiro is the former President of Allscripts.
- Joe Volpe is an investment principal with GHIF, where he is responsible for identifying investment opportunities in health information technology.
More information can be found at www.PhysiciansInteractive.com
