Management Team

Frank joined NDC as General Manager of the NDC Costa Rica Plant in July of 2012.

He brings over 17 years experience in Operations and Manufacturing in several industries such medical devices, semi-conductors and automotive.   Prior to his role at NDC, Frank was Plant Manager at Covidien’s Costa Rica facility and held several positions of increasing management responsibility in manufacturing, operations and supply chain at Intel Corporation, Seton Company and Allergan Medical.

Frank has been part of multiple start-ups and transfers to Costa Rica from the United
States, Europe and Asia. He served on several extensive transfer assignments to Malaysia, Philippines and China.

Frank holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Industrial Engineering from the Costa Rica Institute of Technology and a Dual Degree MBA from Thunderbird School of Global Management (Arizona, U.S.A) and Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, ITESM (Monterrey, Mexico).

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Joe has spent nearly thirty years in the Nitinol industry.  From 1984 to 1994, he worked at Raychem in various planning, supervisory and management positions. Joe earned his degree in Business Management at San Jose State University and subsequently joined NDC in 1995 and was promoted  to Operations Manager within NDC/Johnson & Johnson, with responsibility for the purchasing, planning, device finishing and shipping
& receiving functions at NDC’s Fremont plant.  In 2012,  Joe’s role was expanded to include management of the laser operation, and sustaining engineering function.

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John earned his MS in Metallurgical Engineering & Material Science from the University of Notre Dame, after which he worked at both Chrysler and at National Steel Research. As a research engineer, John developed rolling and forming techniques designed to produce high strength, low alloy steel for automotive and industrial applications, authoring several papers on the topic. He has spent nearly three decades working with shape memory alloys with Raychem and NDC, and has made major contributions to Nitinol melting, forming, and product development. John is responsible for overseeing all NDC material from the ingot to all finished wire, tube, and sheet form.

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Tom received his BS in Physics form Lehigh University in 1974. After working for the Atomic Energy Commission, he returned to school to earn his MS, ME and PhD in Materials Science from Carnegie Mellon University in 1980. He then went to Switzerland, working for three years as a research scientist for Brown-Boveri, Cie. before returning to the U.S. to work at Raychem Corporation. In 1991, he left the corporate environment to found NDC with a consortium of private investors. Tom has served as the president of NDC since its inception in 1991, through its acquisition by Johnson & Johnson in 1997, stepping down in 2007 in order to negotiate an asset purchase back from Johnson & Johnson. While at Johnson & Johnson, he was instrumental in the development of the SMART stent line of products, the TrapEase filter, and several other products within the company’s Cordis division. Tom also served on the Cordis management board and managed its Advanced R&D group. He also co-founded the Society of Shape Memory and Superelastic Technologies, an organization that has since been acquired by the American Society of Metals. He has authored more than a hundred patents and publications in the field of shape memory alloys, as well as the fiction novel Stan’s Leap.

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Chuck Faris is the Vice President of Quality Assurance and Regulatory Affairs. He is an experienced quality professional with a large variety of professional and business experience. Educated at the US Military Academy (West Point, NY) with a BS in Aerospace Engineering in 1984, he spent 6 years in the Army as a Military Intelligence pilot and project manager for DA intelligence systems after graduation. His first medical device experience was with Johnson & Johnson as a production supervisor in 1990. This was followed by promotion to process engineering and eventual leadership of the process engineering group by 1994. His first quality assurance position was as the Quality Manager in 1996 for a small independent company in Johnson & Johnson Medical. This was followed by a Quality Manager position within C.R. Bard in 1997. He rejoined J&J in 1998 as the Quality Manager for Receiving Quality at LifeScan. Chuck joined NDC in 2000 as the Head of Quality. During his career, he has had direct responsibility for production, engineering, quality assurance, regulatory compliance, supplier management, production planning, and lean manufacturing implementation. He is fully experienced in all medical device quality systems, applied statistics and regulatory compliance.

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Doug earned his BS in Management from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, and then went on to serve for several years primarily in law enforcement operations throughout the Caribbean and New England regions.

Doug then started his medical device career with Genzyme Surgical in various sales and marketing roles.  He then worked for Intuitive Surgical as a Marketing Director as the company launched into the U.S. markets and completed the IPO. After Intuitive Surgical, additional experiences included roles as the Global Director of Marketing for Medtronic’s Endovascular Innovations division, as well as commercial leadership roles with early stage companies OmniSonics and OmniGuide Surgical.

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Jeff leads strategic procurement initiatives and relationships for NDC.   Following graduation from the University of Pittsburgh, Jeff entered the Quality and Reliability Assurance field as a civilian employee of the Department of the Army, where he rapidly moved into leadership positions. Jeff became involved with the Nitinol technology in 1988 when he joined the Metals Division of Raychem Corporation. While at Raychem, Jeff made the transition to Operations, serving as the Operations Manager for the Medical Division until he joined NDC in 1996, where he served as Quality Manager during the early growth period of the company. Jeff moved on to become the Director of Quality under NDC/Johnson & Johnson during the initial ISO 9001 registration effort, and returned to Operations as the Plant Manager in 2000, and He became Vice President, Component Operations upon his return to NDC in 2009. In Operations, Jeff spearheaded the transition to Lean Manufacturing and promoted a culture of continuous improvement while launching multiple new product lines and processing techniques.  Recently, he spearheaded the establishment and expansion of NDC’s facilities in Costa Rica.   Jeff’s current position drives strong relationships with key strategic partners in the supply chain.

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Attila has an MD from Semmelweis Medical School, an MBA from Columbia University and an MS in Biotechnology from Johns Hopkins University. Attila spent five years as an entrepreneur as a co-founder of Sparsense, Inc., an early-stage technology company in the medical image processing space, and Guidepath Medical, Inc., a cardiovascular device manufacturer. He then worked for the Cordis and NDC franchises of Johnson & Johnson for seven years, both in the U.S. and Europe. As part of Johnson & Johnson’s leadership development program he held various positions in sales & marketing, professional education and product development. In 2005, he founded Clinasys, LLC, a provider of medical device development services. He returned to NDC in 2008.

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Dave earned his BS in Ocean Engineering at the U.S. Naval Academy and MS in Ocean Engineering at the University of Washington and served as an officer in the U.S. Navy as a E-2C Hawkeye pilot and flight instructor before joining Raychem Corporation. He began his career with Nitinol in 1985 with shape memory couplings and connector products for military aerospace and electronics markets. Since joining NDC in July 1996 the Trade business has enjoyed a tenfold growth in revenues in material and components. Dave was responsible for bringing the first two NDC websites to life and has managed the daily relationships with Euroflex, the company’s European business partner, since 1994.

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Danette brings over 20 years of business experience providing superior human resource management in a variety of industries, including medical device, technology, defense and aerospace technology and professional services. She provides an innovative, yet common-sense approach to strengthening leadership teams and company culture, and works with management to implement programs that target attraction, retention and development of employees. Danette holds a bachelors degree in Psychology and is a certified Zenger-Miller instructor.

This is Danette’s second stint with NDC, having worked here from 2002 – 2007 then returning in early 2011. Prior to her return, Danette and a partner co-founded Human Resource Verities, a consulting firm with a mission to provide cost effective human resources consulting to companies primarily located in the Silicon Valley. Clients included Yahoo!, Cobham, GMS, CIRTEC Medical Systems, and Johnson & Johnson. Before consulting, she worked as a member of the senior management team at Sensiba San Filippo, LLC, and LifeScan, a Johnson & Johnson company.

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Alan received his PhD in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley in 1982, followed by an appointment of postdoctoral research associate in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Stanford University. In 1983, he accepted a position as Associate Metallurgist at Ames Laboratory and adjunct faculty at Iowa State University. In 1986, he became an Assistant Professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Notre Dame. He then accepted a position of Research Manager of the Metals Division at Raychem Corporation in 1989, where he worked on processing and mechanical properties of Nitinol. In 1993, he joined NDC where his responsibilities include process development, component prototyping, and corrosion and fatigue behavior of Nitinol. Not only is he one of the world’s most recognized names in Nitinol, he consults with and is well recognized by the FDA. He has published over 100 technical papers with primary emphasis on the structure, processing, mechanical properties, corrosion behavior, and fatigue properties of Nitinol. He co-founded the Shape Memory and Superelastic Technologies Society and edited the conference proceedings in 1994, 1997, 2000, and 2003.

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Gordon Sangster joined NDC as Chief Financial Officer in October 2011. He previously served as CFO of ITC/NexusDx, a point-of-care blood diagnostic company. Prior to that, he served as CFO of Micrus Endovascular Corporation (NASDAQ: MEND), a company that developed, manufactured and marketed devices for the treatment of cerebral vascular diseases, which was acquired by Johnson and Johnson. He also served as CFO of HemoSense, a POC blood diagnostics company, prior to its acquisition by Alere. Previously, he served as CFO of A.P.Pharma, a drug delivery company, and held various financial management positions at CooperVision and Raychem. He is a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.

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Tim earned his MBA from the Wharton School and MA in International Studies from the Lauder Institute of the University of Pennsylvania. He has been managing commercial operations for major medical device companies since 1994 in positions including Executive Vice President at TruTouch Technologies, VP International at FoxHollow Technologies, VP Europe for Cordis Endovacular, and Managing Director for Johnson & Johnson Russia and Boehringer Mannheim (now Roche) Russia. Tim was also elected to two terms as Chairman of Board for the Association of International Pharmaceutical Manufacturers, which was instrumental in establishing Russia’s healthcare industry during perestroika. Prior to graduate school, Tim worked at Eli Lilly as a Foreign Exchange Trader, and served as a Soviet Counterintelligence Specialist in the US Army Special Forces.

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