MedTech Masters Q&A: Frank Jaskulke

This year, the Bell­mont Part­ners Health team is cel­e­brat­ing its 15th anniver­sary and we’re excit­ed to be shin­ing a spot­light on our health clients and the medtech com­mu­ni­ty. As part of that, we’re intro­duc­ing our Medtech Mas­ters Q&A series.  

First up, we are thrilled to fea­ture Frank Jaskulke. Frank is cur­rent­ly the vice pres­i­dent of sales and busi­ness devel­op­ment at Avio Medtech Con­sult­ing. With near­ly two decades at Med­ical Alley Asso­ci­a­tion, he served in var­i­ous lead­er­ship roles, most recent­ly as vice pres­i­dent of inno­va­tion and head of Med­ical Alley Starts. Frank has been instru­men­tal in advanc­ing the medtech sec­tor, con­nect­ing com­pa­nies with part­ners, investors, and key tal­ent. He has a proven track record in inter­na­tion­al busi­ness devel­op­ment and strate­gic ser­vices, par­tic­u­lar­ly for start­up com­pa­nies. Frank holds a Mas­ter of Polit­i­cal Lead­er­ship from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Min­neso­ta Duluth and a Bach­e­lor of Arts in Polit­i­cal Sci­ence from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Min­neso­ta. He is known for his ded­i­ca­tion to fos­ter­ing inno­va­tion and his deep con­nec­tions with­in the medtech com­mu­ni­ty. 

What is your back­ground in medtech? How did you get start­ed? Twen­ty years ago, I got lucky and start­ed at the front desk for the Med­ical Alley Asso­ci­a­tion. My boss told me, “You’ll get paid to hang out with peo­ple who save lives. And if you do a good job, they’ll save more lives.” I’ve been hooked ever since! I spent 20 years at Med­ical Alley doing every job under the sun and learn­ing from so many. 

Tell us about your role with Avio Medtech Con­sult­ing – what are you work­ing on these days? Avio is a small con­sult­ing group that wants to get big­ger (but not big). My job is to help make that hap­pen. I’ve got sales, mar­ket­ing, and busi­ness devel­op­ment, so I work on find­ing new clients, telling our sto­ry, and help­ing to fig­ure out what we should do next with a great team. Main focus right now is build­ing our sales mod­el (and exe­cut­ing it) while set­ting the stage for mar­ket­ing efforts. 

It’s no secret this year has been a roller­coast­er for many indus­tries, includ­ing medtech, with tar­iffs, FDA cuts, and eco­nom­ic uncer­tain­ty. What is your advice for orga­ni­za­tions to nav­i­gate it all? First, it’s OK to feel down from time to time. Sec­ond, in times like this, doing the right things the right way is even more impor­tant. Third, defer­ring deci­sions or not mak­ing a deci­sion IS mak­ing a deci­sion. Inac­tion only works for so long. 

How can com­mu­ni­ca­tions strate­gies be help­ful in nav­i­gat­ing some of the chal­lenges medtech com­pa­nies are fac­ing? EVERYTHING is com­mu­ni­ca­tion. Work with the FDA is com­mu­ni­ca­tion. Rais­ing cap­i­tal is com­mu­ni­ca­tion. Sales is com­mu­ni­ca­tion. Do it well and suc­cess is more like­ly. Do it poor­ly and even the best tech­nol­o­gy in the best mar­ket may fail. 

Why is medtech such a big indus­try in Min­neso­ta? We got lucky! Earl Bakken was born here. Tru­ly. We got lucky, and then we didn’t mess it up. We got a win, and we dou­bled down on it. But of course, it was also because we invest­ed in edu­ca­tion, afford­able cost of liv­ing, and good health­care. That cre­at­ed the con­di­tions to get lucky. A les­son for all of us – do hard work to make good things hap­pen, and your luck will increase. 

What are the top trends you’re notic­ing in medtech? Every­one talks about AI, and yes, it is inter­est­ing. I’m more inter­est­ed in how our under­stand­ing of phys­i­ol­o­gy and biol­o­gy has advanced so that many ther­a­py ideas are becom­ing ther­a­py real­i­ty. Neu­ro­mod­u­la­tion/bio-elec­tron­ic med­i­cine has explod­ed because sci­ence has advanced to the point where engi­neers are able to build solu­tions. 

Any pre­dic­tions or insights for the medtech indus­try? The chal­leng­ing times we face will bear fruit with new busi­ness mod­els and high­ly inno­v­a­tive com­pa­nies. Be on the look­out for the next dis­rupter. It will prob­a­bly seem like a dumb idea at first. 

A huge thanks to Frank for tak­ing the time to answer our ques­tions and for shar­ing his wis­dom — and for all he does for the medtech indus­try. Stay tuned for our next install­ment in this series – a con­ver­sa­tion with Mark Gard­ner, founder and man­ag­ing part­ner of Gard­ner Law and Chrysalis Incu­ba­tor. 

Do you have a life-chang­ing inno­va­tion and are look­ing for help to bring it mar­ket? We’d love to hear more about it! Con­tact us for a com­pli­men­ta­ry PR strat­e­gy ses­sion and brain­storm.