Five Questions With: Aidan Petrie

Aidan Petrie is co-founder of the New England Medical Innovation Center, a Providence-based nonprofit launched in 2017 to foster life sciences in the Ocean State, and a longtime presence in Rhode Island’s innovation sphere.

Petrie, a Rhode Island School of Design graduate and founder of the medical device development company Ximedica, is now looking within and beyond the Ocean State to further biotech innovation and amplify Rhode Island’s role in the broader life sciences sector.

Building Financial Stability for Your Construction Business

Historically, the construction industry has not been immune to economic volatility. In recent years, COVID-19…

Learn More

PBN: How would you characterize Rhode Island’s current life sciences and biotech sector, and how has it changed since you founded Ximedica in the mid-1980s?

PETRIE: In the early ’90s, there were a couple of larger companies, Davol being the best known, and there were almost no service providers and few startups. Today, there are dozens of service providers – design, engineering, manufacturing, labs – and a vibrant startup community [that] can be largely traced back to the growth of Ximedica, which is now one of the world’s largest national and international product developers. We also have an active and knowledgeable investment community today.

- Advertisement -

PBN: Why did you decide to co-launch NEMIC, and what is the organization’s overall goal?

PETRIE: Lydia Shin Schroter and I started NEMIC to fill a knowledge gap that we had seen time and time again – good entrepreneurs with good technologies did not know what they did not know, and that often ended badly.

NEMIC, a nonprofit 501(c)(3), is primarily in the education space and is actively working with more than 50 companies, half of which are in the state. We collaborate at MIT [Massachusetts Institute of Technology] and Harvard and are speaking at the Mayo Clinic and Dartmouth.

Last year, we had 60 overseas companies fly to Providence for immersion and education into our unique health care system. Our primary goal is to help shepherd more life-improving technologies to market, but also to see more of those companies centered in Rhode Island.

PBN: What does Rhode Island need to elevate its life sciences and biotech profile – particularly as a neighbor of Boston, one of the nation’s most prominent biotech spheres?

PETRIE: So NEMIC addresses one side of the life sciences industry: devices, diagnostics and digital health. While we have a well-developed knowledge and service provider community, we do not have the funds to truly support it. The Rhode Island Foundation, the [R.I.] Department of Labor and Training, and R.I. Commerce [Corp.] have been excellent supporters of our mission and have allowed us to support startups within the state.

On the other side is biotech, and this industry is dependent on building wet labs if it is ever going to compete with the powerful hub to the north.

PBN: What are your thoughts on the state’s proposed biotech “hub,” and how do you anticipate this proposal could impact life sciences entrepreneurs in Rhode Island?

PETRIE: We have been very specific; we need to offer a competitive package of grants and support to attract, build and retain companies in R.I. We can compete with other states, and the dollars and risk level are low compared to the benefit to our state, and it’s shovel-ready. The speaker, governor, and [R.I.] Commerce all see the value of building on what is already working.

PBN: How did your education background, particularly at the Rhode Island School of Design, lead you into the medical innovation sector?

PETRIE: That is a great question and an important one. The design process places functionality and the user at the core of that process. Who is a product, building, or service for, and what is it supposed to do? Well, the FDA [Food and Drug Administration] starts its required process with precisely the same premise – “user needs.”

In this case, it is driven by what the physician, nurse, patient and/or caregiver need to do to deliver a health outcome, but it also requires that the solution is demonstrated to be usable by those parties.

Part of Ximedica’s success was that designers and researchers worked alongside engineers to develop solutions. There is a big opportunity for Brown [University], the Warren Alpert Medical School and RISD to collaborate much more effectively in health care.

Jacquelyn Voghel is a PBN staff writer. You may reach her at Voghel@PBN.com.