Dr. Andrew Rickman, OBE

Dr Andrew Rickman OBE is the founder and chief executive officer of Rockley Photonics.

Andrew was previously the founder, CEO and chairman of Bookham Inc., now a part of Lumentum [NASDAQ: LITE] (after its 2018 acquisition of Oclaro Inc. [NASDAQ: OCLR], which was formed in 2009 after Bookham’s merger with Avanex Inc.), one of the world’s largest photonics and fiber optics telecom component producers, headquartered in Milpitas, CA, USA. Andrew founded Bookham in 1988 and grew the company from a start-up to a FTSE100 company as CEO and latterly chaired the business through the consolidation of the telecoms industry.

More recently he was chairman of Kotura Inc., a leader in the field of silicon photonics for fiber optic communications, high performance computing and sensing applications. He was instrumental in its development and sale to Mellanox Technologies, Ltd., for $82 million in 2013.

In 2000, Andrew was named UK’s Technology and Communications Entrepreneur of the Year by Ernst and Young. Andrew has held advisory board positions with the East Asia Institute of the University of Cambridge and Applied Science and Technology Research Institute of Hong Kong. In 2011, Andrew was awarded an Honorary Professorship at SIMIT, Chinese Academy of Sciences. He was a Trustee of The Oxford Trust. He was previously a council member of the UK Government’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).

Andrew has a mechanical engineering degree from Imperial College, London; a PhD in silicon photonics from Surrey University, an MBA from Cranfield University and honorary doctorates from Surrey, Edinburgh Napier and Kingston Universities. He is a chartered engineer and a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Physics.

He was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s Millennium Honors list for services to the telecommunications industry and is a winner of the prestigious Royal Academy of Engineering Silver medal for his outstanding contribution to British Engineering.

Aaron Zilkie

Aaron Zilkie is the CTO of Photonics and a Co-Founder.

Aaron led the early core photonic platform development at Rockley Photonics and currently leads Rockley’s internal technology/R&D team developing novel integrated photonics technologies for high-growth product solutions. He is also responsible for the IP portfolio development.

Aaron brings over 22 years of experience and leadership in technology innovation, R&D, new product development, and IP portfolio development in a broad range of optics and photonics application areas including biosensing, healthcare monitoring, 3D imaging, LiDAR, data communications, high-performance computing, and fiber optic networks.

Prior to Rockley, Aaron served as Technical Program Manager at Kotura/Mellanox Technologies, where he led development of the silicon photonics hybrid laser technology. Prior to that, he was a Senior Optical Scientist at Oclaro, Inc., where he was lead engineer for new product introduction of a variety of optical modules and helped lead the development of new products from early phase through production ramp.

Aaron holds over 40 granted U.S. patents, has authored numerous journal publications and white papers, and has given numerous invited conference presentations on Rockley’s technology.

Aaron has a Ph.D. and a Master of Science degree in Electrical Engineering (Photonics) from the University of Toronto and a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Manitoba.

Ben Ver Steeg

Ben Ver Steeg is the SVP of Sensing Product Development for Rockley Photonics.

Ben leads Rockley’s optical sensor product development team with a focus on non-invasive optical sensing for healthcare and wellness applications. He is responsible for leading the cross-functional teams involved in sensor hardware design, firmware implementation, application science, algorithm development, and human performance testing.

Ben brings over 20 years entrepreneurial experience in developing and commercializing non-invasive optical sensor technology. Prior to joining Rockley, Ben was a founder and CEO of TruTouch Technologies. TruTouch was a venture-backed company that produced the world’s first non-invasive optical alcohol sensor technology, which was used by law enforcement and in industrial safety applications. Named one of Time magazine’s inventions of the year, the optical, touch-based technology was also adopted by the NHTSA-funded DADSS program for use in automotive safety sensors. Rockley acquired TruTouch in 2020 to reinforce their strategic focus on developing optical biosensing products.

Ben holds multiple patents and has co-authored multiple academic and industry publications in the field of optical sensing. Ben continues to be active in the field of biophotonics as a senior member of SPIE and as an advisory board member for UC Riverside’s Department of Bioengineering. Ben holds a BS in biomedical and electrical engineering from Harvey Mudd College.

Casimir Wierzynski

Casimir “Cas” Wierzynski is the SVP of Cloud and AI for Rockley Photonics.

Cas leads the company’s cloud and AI product development and engineering with a focus on healthcare and wellness applications. He is responsible for defining product vision, strategy, and objectives, including driving execution cross-functionally within the broader organization.

With over 27 years of business, finance, and neuroscience experience, Cas leads highly complex technology and engineering teams to solve high-impact problems using AI. Prior to joining Rockley, Cas served as Senior Director of the AI Product Group at Intel Corporation where he led the effort to identify and incubate emerging technologies for next-generation AI systems. Prior to Intel, Cas held the role of Autonomy Lead and Neuromorphic Systems Lead at Qualcomm and was a Vice President at Goldman Sachs.

Cas holds multiple U.S. patents and patents pending in the fields of autonomous robotics, neuromorphic computing, and machine learning. Cas has also authored numerous industry articles and academic publications, including in Neuron, Optics Express, and Fortune and in leading computer science conferences.

Cas holds a Ph.D. in Computation & Neural Systems from the California Institute of Technology, a BA in Mathematics from Cambridge University, and a SB, SM, in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Cas has proficiency in multiple languages, including English, French, German and Spanish.

Chad Becker

Chad Becker is the Interim CFO for Rockley Photonics.

Chad brings over 20 years of experience and leadership spanning finance and treasury. Prior to joining Rockley, he was vice president of financial planning and analytics at Tuft & Needle, the direct-to-consumer division of Serta Simmons Bedding. From 2017 through 2021, Chad was assistant treasurer at NetApp, a Fortune 500 data management company, where he led capital markets and treasury operations. Prior to NetApp, he served 11 years at Microsoft in key roles, including capital markets, corporate finance, and investments.

Chad holds the Chartered Financial Analyst® designation and earned a bachelor’s degree in finance and economics from the University of Arizona and an MBA from the University of Nevada at Las Vegas. He currently serves on the board of trustees for the University of Arizona Foundation.

Ciaran Rooney

Ciaran Rooney is SVP of Corporate Development for Rockley Photonics. Ciaran works closely with the CEO and CFO on all strategic initiatives, including all corporate development, strategic partnerships, and key commercial and corporate relationships.

Ciaran has worked with and advised highly disruptive technology companies for over a decade as a key advisor to the executive teams of companies and has been through multiple IPOs and fundraisings, while leading corporate development and strategic initiatives. He has a unique combination of extensive experience across the emerging company lifecycle (from start-up to IPO) and strong international experience, taking the lead on transactions across Europe, USA, and Asia.

Ciaran is a qualified Solicitor of England and Wales, and prior to Rockley, he advised and worked for multiple venture capital funds and disruptive technology companies on all aspects of fundraising and the disruptive technology company lifecycle. Prior to that, he was a senior associate at Cooley, based in their London office advising leading emerging companies and venture capital investors.

David Nelson

David Nelson is the SVP of Integrated Circuit Design for Rockley Photonics.

Since first joining Rockley in 2015, David has been successfully leading the IC Design Team in the development of high-performance, very low-power transceiver circuits.

Prior to joining Rockley, David served as principal engineer at Intel, where he designed their next-generation products, including the high-speed transceiver chipset used in the Intel 100G silicon photonics transceiver. Prior to Intel, David designed the Light Peak product for Intel-Apple and the first 10G SFP+ transceiver chipset used by Google in high volumes. Early in his career, David was also the founder and CEO of Comlinear Corporation until it was acquired by National Semiconductor Corporation. Throughout the course of his 40-year technical career, David has held senior leadership positions with small and large companies including Cirrus Logic, Conexant Semiconductor, and PicoLight.

David holds over 20 U.S. patents, has numerous patents pending, and has been published in various technical journals.

David holds a M.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of California at Los Angeles and a B.Sc. degree in Physics from Brigham Young University.

Hooman Abediasl

Hooman Abediasl is the EVP of Product Engineering for Rockley Photonics.

Hooman brings years of experience in silicon photonics, optical sensors, and silicon photonics (SiP) sensing products. He leads a rapidly growing team responsible for all sensing product development.

Hooman has been an industry contributor for numerous years, authoring and co-authoring several articles, such as the 2015 highly cited world record demonstration and ground-breaking publication, “Monolithic optical phased-array transceiver in a standard SOI CMOS process.” He joined Rockley Photonics in 2014.

Hooman is the winner of the Nokia Bell Labs 1st prize in 2016 for his work on “Large-Scale Plasmonic Optical Phased Array – an architectural innovation for nanodevices.” He also received prestigious Annenberg Fellowship at the University of Southern California in 2010 and has been awarded numerous other honors, such as the best Ph.D. dissertation thesis of Viterbi School of Engineering in 2017.

Hooman holds a Ph.D. and a Master of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California, as well as a Master of Science degree and Bachelor of Science degree in Communication Systems and Electrical Engineering from Sharif University of Technology in Tehran, Iran.

Khalilah El-Amin

Khalilah El-Amin currently oversees recruitment, talent engagement and development, compensation, benefits, compliance, office administration, and facilities.

With over 15 years of experience, Khalilah has had a dynamic management career with diverse business experience in human resources, administration, and project management.

Prior to joining Rockley, Khalilah served as director of human capital for KIPP LA Schools, a non-profit organization that operates public charter schools focused on preparing students in under-resourced communities for success in school, college, and life. Prior to KIPP, Khalilah led human resources at Fulcum Microsystems, a private, hi-tech, fabless-semiconductor company, until it was acquired by Intel Corporation in 2011.

Khalilah holds an MBA from the University of LaVerne and a BA degree from Spelman College. She also holds professional HR designations from the Human Resources Certification Institute and the Society of Human Resources Management.

Sanjiv Kapoor

Sanjiv Kapoor is the EVP of Operations for Rockley Photonics.

Sanjiv is responsible for the execution of the company’s Silicon Photonics process roadmap, including developing process flows, leading process development, and qualifying foundries for mass production.

Sanjiv brings over 25 years of technical and leadership experience in product development and supplier management at startups and large public companies in the area of semiconductors, clean tech, flexible electronics, and component development for defense applications.

Prior to joining Rockley, Sanjiv served as Senior Director of Foundry Operations for TDK InvenSense, where he was responsible for global foundry process development, new product launch, and mass manufacturing.

Before TDK InvenSense, Sanjiv held the role of Director of Technology Development at Lenovo MEMS systems lab, where he led Lenovo’s fingerprint sensor development group. Prior to that, Sanjiv held senior leadership positions of increasing responsibility with Bloom Energy, Fidelica Microsystems, Vitex, and WJ Communications.

Sanjiv holds a Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from Stanford University.

Vish Kulkarni

Vish Kulkarni is the SVP of Commercial for Rockley Photonics.

As the head of commercial team, Vish leads product strategy and management, marketing, sales, and business development for Rockley’s wellness and healthcare products. Vish and his team are responsible for driving profitable growth through customer sourcing, closing, and management.

Vish brings over 20 years of experience with multiple leadership positions across different healthcare verticals, including digital health, diagnostics, and medical devices.
Prior to joining Rockley in 2021, Vish was driving platform roadmap and strategy at Cepheid, a Danaher Company, where he was responsible for launching multiple hardware and software products during his tenure and managed the global marketing team responsible for defining the overall platform roadmap and commercialization strategy. Before Cepheid, Vish held various technical and commercial roles at cutting-edge medical device companies, including Medtronic and iRhythm Technologies.

Vish holds an M.B.A. from the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, a M.S. in Computer Engineering from Wright State University and a B.S. in Electronics Engineering from Mumbai University.

Dr. Andrew Rickman, OBE

Dr Andrew Rickman OBE is the founder and chief executive officer of Rockley Photonics.

Andrew was previously the founder, CEO and chairman of Bookham Inc., now a part of Lumentum [NASDAQ: LITE] (after its 2018 acquisition of Oclaro Inc. [NASDAQ: OCLR], which was formed in 2009 after Bookham’s merger with Avanex Inc.), one of the world’s largest photonics and fiber optics telecom component producers, headquartered in Milpitas, CA, USA. Andrew founded Bookham in 1988 and grew the company from a start-up to a FTSE100 company as CEO and latterly chaired the business through the consolidation of the telecoms industry.

More recently he was chairman of Kotura Inc., a leader in the field of silicon photonics for fiber optic communications, high performance computing and sensing applications. He was instrumental in its development and sale to Mellanox Technologies, Ltd., for $82 million in 2013.

In 2000, Andrew was named UK’s Technology and Communications Entrepreneur of the Year by Ernst and Young. Andrew has held advisory board positions with the East Asia Institute of the University of Cambridge and Applied Science and Technology Research Institute of Hong Kong. In 2011, Andrew was awarded an Honorary Professorship at SIMIT, Chinese Academy of Sciences. He was a Trustee of The Oxford Trust. He was previously a council member of the UK Government’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).

Andrew has a mechanical engineering degree from Imperial College, London; a PhD in silicon photonics from Surrey University, an MBA from Cranfield University and honorary doctorates from Surrey, Edinburgh Napier and Kingston Universities. He is a chartered engineer and a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Physics.

He was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s Millennium Honors list for services to the telecommunications industry and is a winner of the prestigious Royal Academy of Engineering Silver medal for his outstanding contribution to British Engineering.

Brian Blaser

Brian Blaser retired from Abbott Laboratories in 2019, having served as executive vice president of diagnostic products since June 1, 2012. Prior to that, he held a number of senior and corporate roles in operations and strategy at Abbott from 2004.

He has over 25 years of experience in the in-vitro diagnostics industry, leading global organizations of significant scale and complexity, and has a proven ability to define business strategy and implement difficult change programs that drive growth, profitability, and customer satisfaction.

He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering Technology from the University of Dayton and Master’s Degree in Business Administration from Rochester Institute of Technology.

Dr. Caroline Brown

Caroline Brown is an independent director and chairs the audit committee of the board, having joined Rockley Photonics in January 2019. She has over 20 years main board experience and an early career with BAML, UBS, and HSBC, advising global corporations and governments on capital markets and mergers and acquisitions.

Caroline also currently sits on three London-listed public company boards: IP Group plc, a FTSE250 business commercializing intellectual property in life sciences and technology; Georgia Capital plc, a listed private equity firm which owns the largest healthcare services business in Georgia; and Luceco plc, an industrial technology manufacturing business.

Caroline is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants and holds a first-class degree and Ph.D. in Natural Sciences from the University of Cambridge, and an MBA from the Case Business School, University of London.

Karim Karti

Karim Karti is chair of Med Tech Acquisitions corporation. He has also been a consultant to Rockley advising on digital healthcare. Previously, he was COO of iRhythm Technologies, a digital health company.

Prior to that, he was with General Electric for 22 years. He successfully led multiple GE healthcare businesses across the globe. He was chief marketing officer for the entire $20B GE Healthcare division before being President & CEO of the $9B GE Healthcare Imaging business, where he drove a step change in growth, profitability, and innovation.

Karim graduated from École Centrale de Lyon and completed the entrepreneurship program of École Supérieure de Commerce de Lyon.

Michele Klein

Michele Klein is an independent director and chairs Rockley’s Nominating and Governance Committee. In 2021 she was elected a director of Aviat Networks, a provider of wireless transport solutions. In 2019 she was appointed a director of Intevac, a developer of thin film deposition systems. Earlier she served as a director of Photon Control, a provider of optical sensors and systems to the semiconductor industry, from 2017 until its 2021 acquisition by MKSI.

From 2005-2010 Michele was senior director of Applied Ventures LLC, the venture capital arm of Applied Materials. She led investments in energy storage and solar energy, and represented Applied on the boards of technology companies. Ms. Klein was CEO of Boxer Cross, a semiconductor equipment manufacturer, from 1997-2003 when it was acquired by Applied Materials. She led High Yield Technology, a semiconductor metrology company, until its acquisition by Pacific Scientific in 1996.

Her investment and capital markets experience, knowledge of public and private companies, and experience in semiconductor, equipment, wireless, and tech-enabled services, qualify her to serve as a director. Ms. Klein earned a BS from the University of Illinois and an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Dr. Nicolaus Henke

Nicolaus Henke is a senior partner emeritus of McKinsey & Company. He brings to the board over 35 years of business experience, including 30 years with McKinsey & Company. In 2003, he began serving as a senior partner and led McKinsey’s healthcare practice worldwide. In 2015, he founded McKinsey Analytics to build McKinsey’s global capabilities in machine learning. Additionally, he served on the firm’s shareholders council (its board of directors) and on its partner and senior partner personnel review panel. In 2020, he founded the McKinsey Technology Council.

Throughout his career, Dr. Henke has advised top teams in leading health systems, medical device companies, and pharmaceutical companies on strategy, operations, and organization. He initiated and oversaw eight acquisitions and partnerships, built a team of 3,000 technologists and consultants, and oversaw McKinsey’s digital capabilities.

In addition, Dr. Henke serves on the board of directors of Innovations in Healthcare, a global initiative on innovative healthcare delivery founded by Duke Medicine, McKinsey, and the World Economic Forum. He also serves on the dean’s advisory council for the Harvard Kennedy School.

Dr. Henke holds a Master of Public Administration degree from Harvard University, where he was selected as a John J. McCloy scholar, and a master’s degree and a doctorate in business administration from the University of Muenster, Germany.

Dr. Pamela Puryear

Pamela Puryear is EVP of Global HR at Walgreen Boots. Previously, she was a senior vice president and chief human resources officer at Zimmer Biomet and senior vice president and chief talent officer at Pfizer. She began her career in financial services, after which she ran an independent organization development consulting practice, working with clients in financial services, healthcare, professional services, consumer products, insurance, and education.

Pamela has a BA degree in psychology from Yale University, an MBA from Harvard Business School, and a Ph.D. in organizational psychology from California School of Professional Psychology.

Richard Kuntz

Most recently, Dr. Rick Kuntz was senior vice president, chief medical and scientific officer of Medtronic and served as a member of the company’s executive committee. In this role, Kuntz oversaw the company’s medical affairs, health policy and reimbursement, clinical research activities, and corporate technology.

Rick joined Medtronic in October 2005 as senior vice president and president of Medtronic Neuromodulation, which encompasses the company’s products and therapies used in the treatment of chronic pain, movement disorders, spasticity, overactive bladder and urinary retention, benign prostatic hyperplasia, and gastroparesis. In this role, he was responsible for the research, development, operations, and product sales and marketing for each of these therapeutic areas worldwide.

Rick brings a broad background and expertise in many different areas of healthcare. Prior to Medtronic, he was the founder and chief scientific officer of the Harvard Clinical Research Institute (HCRI), a university-based contract research organization that coordinates National Institutes of Health (NIH) and industry clinical trials with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Kuntz has directed numerous multicenter clinical trials and authored more than 250 original peer-reviewed publications. His major interests are traditional and alternative clinical trial design and biostatistics.

Rick also served as associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, chief of the division of clinical biometrics, and as an interventional cardiologist in the division of cardiovascular diseases at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Kuntz has served as a member of the board of governors of the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI), part of the Affordable Care Act, from 2010-2018.

Rick graduated from Miami University and received his medical degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. He completed his residency and chief residency in internal medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School, Parkland Hospital, Dallas, and then completed fellowships in cardiovascular diseases and interventional cardiology at the Beth Israel Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston. Kuntz received his Master of Science in biostatistics from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

William Huyett

Bill Huyett is director emeritus of McKinsey and Company, Inc., where he spent 30 years serving global clients in biopharmaceuticals, medical devices, industrial, and other technology-intensive companies. His transaction experience across companies ranging in size from $100M market cap to $200B market cap includes mergers, spin-outs, IPOs, and licensing. He led the firm’s strategy and corporate finance practice and served on the firm’s board. He is a co-author of Value, a text on corporate finance for CEOs, CFOs, and boards, published by John Wiley & Sons in 2011.

Subsequent to his retirement from McKinsey, he became the chief financial officer of Cyclerion Therapeutics (CYCN), a NASDAQ-listed biopharmaceutical company in Cambridge, MA. CYCN was spun out of Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, where he had been the chief operating officer.

He was, until the company’s merger in August 2020, non-executive board chair of Georgia Healthcare Group, Georgia’s leading healthcare services company (listed on the London Stock Exchange).

Earlier in his career, Bill held a variety of line management positions in the automation industry with Rockwell/Allen-Bradley. His degrees in electronics engineering and business are from the University of Virginia. He also serves on the boards of Rockefeller University and the Marine Biological Laboratory.

Mark Arnold

Mark A. Arnold, Ph.D. is the Edwin B. Green Chair in Laser Chemistry, professor of chemistry and director of the Center for Biocatalysis and Bioprocessing (CBB) at the University of Iowa. He is a widely recognized expert in the non-invasive optical monitoring of biomarkers such as glucose and urea. In 2016, Dr. Arnold received the Senior Spectroscopist Designation from the Society for Applied Spectroscopy. He has been the Fellow of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy since 2010 and was a collegiate fellow at the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Iowa from 2001 to 2006.

Zahi Fayad

Zahi A. Fayad, Ph.D. is a professor of Radiology and Medicine (cardiology) at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and holds the Lucy G. Moses Professorship in Medical Imaging and Bioengineering at the Icahn School of Medicine in New York. He is the founding director of Mount Sinai’s Biomedical Engineering and Imaging Institute and vice chair for research in the Department of Radiology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Dr. Fayad’s interdisciplinary and discipline-bridging research — from engineering to biology and from pre-clinical to clinical investigations — has been dedicated to the detection and prevention of cardiovascular disease, with many seminal contributions in the field of multimodality biomedical imaging, nanomedicine, AI/ML in Imaging, and digital mobile health. Dr. Fayad is a paid consultant for Rockley Photonics.

Stavros Kavouras

Stavros Kavouras, Ph.D. is an assistant dean of graduate education and professor of nutrition at Arizona State University. He directs the Hydration Science Lab, where he is studying the mechanisms by which water intake can impact health and performance. His current research focuses on the effect of water intake on glucose regulation and its implication on children’s hydration and obesity. Dr. Kavouras has authored more than 150 peer-review articles and 9,000 citations and has given lectures in 29 countries.

David Klonoff

David C. Klonoff, M.D. is an endocrinologist specializing in the development and use of diabetes technology. He is the medical director of the Dorothy L. and James E. Frank Diabetes Research Institute of Mills-Peninsula Medical Center in San Mateo, California, and is a Clinical Professor of Medicine at University of California San Francisco. Dr. Klonoff received the American Diabetes Association’s Outstanding Physician Clinician Award in 2019. He received an FDA Director’s Special Citation Award from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2010 for outstanding contributions related to diabetes technology. In 2012, Dr. Klonoff was elected to the College of Fellows at the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), representing the top 2% of the world’s medical and biological engineers. He is founding editor of the Journal of Diabetes Science and Technology.