How to Build a Community of Investors

Key Learnings From Conor’s Experience

• Be selective with where you innovate. Disrupt where it matters most, but don't reinvent the wheel unnecessarily. By aligning with established practices, you can streamline your development processes, reduce costs, and ultimately leave room for creative freedom where it counts.

• Although less common in medtech, community fundraising rounds may offer benefits like brand awareness and direct engagement with potential end users. View all investors as valued partners to foster a strong community around your product and make sure to maintain open and consistent communication with all of your financial supporters. 

• Everyone in the healthcare supply chain, from payers to providers, needs a reason to choose your product. To successfully launch a medical device, it's crucial to understand the needs of all stakeholders involved and not assume anything. Talk to your potential audience directly, regardless of their role or level of expertise.

Conor Cullinane might be the Iron Man of medical devices. Driven by the simple question, ''Is this going to be awesome?", he’s walked an extraordinary path.

Conor grew up in Southern New Hampshire, about a mile from a grass strip airfield, and spent his summers watching airplanes fly by his window. Intrigued, he started tinkering with RC airplanes and eventually moved on to flying real ones.

Although he pursued an undergraduate degree in aeronautical engineering, Conor also harbored a deep interest in human health. This prompted him to minor in biomedical engineering and later obtain a PhD in medical engineering and medical physics, specializing in healthcare innovation. 

Although designing spacesuits at NASA sounds like the dream job for a kid who grew up with a passion for flying, Conor was bitten by the startup bug and eventually co-founded Pirouette Medical. As the CEO, Conor and his team are developing Quicpush, a discrete, disc-shaped injector designed to deliver medicines more easily and effectively through the simple press of a button. The initial focus is on administering epinephrine and naloxone to treat severe allergic reactions and drug overdoses.

The idea for Quicpush arose from a news story about a child's allergic reaction, reminding Conor of his brother's struggles with severe allergies that required him to carry an EpiPen all the time. Realizing the technology hadn't evolved significantly since his brother's diagnosis, Conor sought to create a safer, more user-friendly solution.

Pirouette Medical has successfully demonstrated Quicpush's feasibility and is nearing the completion of design verification, a crucial step towards regulatory approval. The company's next milestone is preparing registration batches for final design validation testing, paving the way for market clearance.