Kolaleh Eskandanian

Kolaleh Eskandanian, Ph.D. is the Vice President and Chief Innovation Officer at CNH. She is also the principal investigator of the FDA-funded National Capital Consortium for Pediatric Device Innovation, focused on accelerating the path to market for pediatric devices. Dr. Eskandanian works with a large network of small and large businesses, nonprofits, and government agencies—all to promote addressing the unmet medical needs of children. She is the producer of two annual innovation competitions that select small businesses that demonstrate the ability to address a significant medical need in the pediatric space. Since early 2014, over 100 pediatric medical device companies have been funded and/or received technical expertise through these competitions. As a result of this initiative, over 10 pediatric medical devices have received FDA clearance or CE mark approval. Dr. Eskandanian is the lead inventor of the first-ever adverse event reporting system, initially deployed in a research academic environment. This technology and its derivatives have now been in the market for over 10 years. She has had leadership roles in the development of the first web-based trouble entry management system for a Fortune 100 company in the telecommunications sector. She has been a key contributor in securing over $50 million in government funding for two large research enterprises. Prior to joining CNH, Kolaleh held positions with Intelsat, Accenture, and Georgetown University. Kolaleh’s background is in mechanical engineering with a PhD in operations science and an MBA.