Dr Ramesh Kekunnaya

Network Director, Capacity Building (External Organizations); Director, The Child Sight Institute and the Technology Innovation; Head - Jasti V Ramanamma Children’s Eye Care Centre Consultant Ophthalmologist

Dr Kekunnaya received his basic medical training from the Karnataka Medical College, Hubli, and specialized in ophthalmology from the Government Medical College, Mysore. He completed a fellowship in Paediatric and Neuro Ophthalmology, Strabismus and Comprehensive Ophthalmology at LVPEI, followed by a Paediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus Fellowship (AAPOS accredited) at the Jules Stein Eye Institute, University of California, USA. His core clinical interests include simple and complex strabismus in adults and children (squint), childhood cataract, vision development, myopia, amblyopia (lazy eye) and neuro-ophthalmological disorders in children. Dr Kekunnaya has authored over 150 publications in peer-reviewed journals in addition to having written over 25 text book chapters. He is the Paediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus Section Editor for the British Journal of Ophthalmology, the Current Eye Research, and the BMJ Open Ophthalmology. He has presented widely, is invited as keynote speakers at both national and global levels, and is passionate about teaching.

Dr Padmaja Kumari Rani

Network Head, Tele-Ophthalmology, Consultant – Smt. Kanuri Santamma Retina Vitreous Service,L V Prasad Eye Institute

Dr Padmaja Kumari Rani is currently Adjunct Associate Professor of Ophthalmology at the University of Rochester, New York. She completed her basic medical degree from Rangaraya Medical College and her MS (Ophthalmology) from Osmania Medical College, Hyderabad. She did a post-doctoral fellowship in vitreoretinal diseases (Fellow of National Board) at Sankara Nethralaya, Chennai, followed by a fellowship with the International Council of Ophthalmology in Basic and Clinical Sciences Assessment. She completed FRCS (Fellow of Royal College of Surgeons, Glasgow) in March 2016. She is passionate about building and mentoring screening programs for Retinopathy of Prematurity. She is the Key Investigator of Indian Twin Cities Retinopathy of Prematurity Program (ITCROPS) at LVPEI, Hyderabad (2009 Jan – till date). She is Coordinating a neonatal intensive care unit rural ROP screening program at Adilabad District. She has conducted several master classes and workshops for ophthalmologists and paediatricians in the screening and management of ROP in India and Bangladesh.

Dr Shrikant Bharadwaj

Scientist & Network Associate Director - Brien Holden Institute of Optometry and Vision Sciences

Shrikant Bharadwaj completed his undergraduate degree in Optometry from the Elite School of Optometry, Chennai and a PhD in Vision Science from the University of California Berkeley School of Optometry, USA. After completing his post-doctoral training in Vision Science at the Indiana University School of Optometry, USA, Dr Bharadwaj returned to the L V Prasad Eye Institute (LVPEI) in Hyderabad as a DBT Ramalingaswami Fellow in 2009. He then established the Visual Optics research laboratory at LVPEI with the overall agenda of understanding how the optics of the eye influences spatial vision and depth vision. Dr Bharadwaj uses a combination of experimental, behavioural and computational techniques to address this research agenda. His laboratory actively publishes research work in international peer-reviewed vision science journals and the research work is generously supported by extramural grants from the Government of India and the optical industry. Dr Bharadwaj also serves on the editorial board of Nature Scientific Reports, Optometry and Vision Science, PLoS One and the Indian Journal of Ophthalmology. He also serves as a peer-reviewer for almost all optometry and vision science journals. In addition to his research work, Dr Bharadwaj serves as the Network Associate Director of the Brien Holden Institute of Optometry and Vision Sciences at LVPEI. He is also actively involved in teaching undergraduate and postgraduate students of optometry at the L V Prasad Eye Institute.

Ms Pushpa Vijayaraghavan

Director & Practice Lead-Healthcare at Sathguru Management Consultants

Pushpa’s key focus is on strategy, technology transfer and innovation advancement across domains of healthcare. She advises enterprises on their overall innovation strategies, portfolio planning, access to external research and development, innovation financing, intellectual property assessments and commercialization strategies. She has extensive with knowledge and experience across commercial considerations, business modelling, regulatory requirements, and IP implications to steer market entry and accelerate growth. Pushpa serves as an alumni advisor to the India Business Conference at the University of Michigan and is a mentor on the MassConnect where she advises biotech ventures identified for mentorship. She currently serves as a board member for the Medicine Patent Pool (MPP), Geneva.

Dr Goutam Bhattacharyya

Patent Attorney and Chair of Patent Practice at K&S Partners

Dr Goutam handles patent drafting and prosecution in the fields of Life Sciences. He represents several multinational and domestic corporations on a variety of IP issues and works very closely with several start-ups and spin-offs. He also assists clients in issues related to patentability, licensing, due diligence and IP valuation and regularly conducts patent workshops and ‘Invention Capturing Sessions’ for clients. He has significant experience and a proven track record of assisting biotechnology and biomedical startups, providing strategic advice on filing and best practices, in addition to pure patent prosecution. Besides patent drafting and prosecution, he has been active in IP awareness creation amongst the Universities, Incubation Centers and MSMEs. Goutam is a member of the India-US Working Group on IPR at the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI). Goutam also serves as a member of several Institutional Committees of National Institutes including National Institute of Pathology and National Institute of Immunology.

Ms Manaswini Pai

Manager - Investments & Portfolio Management | Health and Wellness at Social Alpha

Manaswini is passionate about leveraging innovations and catalytic capital as tools to solve some of the most complex and unaddressed societal challenges. Currently, she is working as a portfolio manager at the health and wellness SIU at Social Alpha. Social Alpha is a 'lab-to-market' enablement for entrepreneurs who are addressing humanity’s greatest developmental challenges by leveraging the power of technology and market-creating innovations. Prior to Social Alpha, she worked across different initiatives at the intersection of innovations, entrepreneurship and ecosystem development, ranging from capacity building, acceleration and investing.