People make the difference

Pasi is an internationally acknowledged business and finance professional – specialized in sensor systems, health IT and bioinformatics – with 20 years of experience as an entrepreneur, consult, early stage financier, advisor,… and also working with his PhD projects.

His core responsibilities at SPARK Finland are general management of the program, contribution with the SPARK Global network, and supporting SPARKees in health IT/bioinformatics and commercial aspects. He is appointed also as a member of SPARK Global Steering Group and Chairman of global working group on “Finance”.

Juho is a seasoned biomedical technology professional with ten years of experience in managing commercialization of academic discoveries and projects at University of Tampere and Tampere University of Technology. Alongside with SPARK duties he works as an operations manager at BioMediTech Institute with responsibilities in commercialization projects.

His core responsibilities at SPARK Finland are coordination of Tampere region activities, educational elements and mentor network, and supporting SPARKees in engineering and medical technology challenges.

Juuso is a cardiologist by training and brings a wide spectrum of competencies on drug development from pre-clinical through phases I-IV, clinical research, regulatory issues, companion diagnostics and eHealth. Whilst continuing his clinical engagement in cardiology, his former assignments include Director Physician role at AstraZeneca R&D (Gothenburg, Sweden) and research physician at The George Institute for Global Health, Sydney, Australia. Alongside with SPARK duties he works at Turku University Hospital as a Chief Medical Innovation Officer.

His core responsibilities at SPARK Finland are in the fields of medical expertise, regulatory aspects and clinical trials. He is also preparing a new site to our Finnish program.

Raija has a long career as an assistant in several departments at the University of Helsinki. She has been former assistant for the dean of the Faculty of Medicine, and currently she works at Faculty of Medicine, Clinicum on-site service team. She has expertise in administrative functions and collaboration between scientific and clinical institutions.

Her core responsibilities at SPARK Finland are support activities, organizing meetings and events, and reporting to our support network.