I am a Mechanical Engineer and Product Manager who works in the field of computer aided design, specifically CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics). I am now at Dassault Systemes in Waltham as part of their SIMULIA division, and currently lead the Fluids product management team. One of the products I am responsible for is PowerFLOW, which is used for aerodynamic vehicle design by many of the vehicle manufacturers. 

IIT AGNE is the association of IIT alumni in the New England area. We are educators, professionals and students working in technology & business who are deeply interested in the current and future innovative trends in STEM, and how we can contribute to solving the problems of today' society and tomorrow's issues. We are active in the Boston tech ecosystem and conduct technology focused events regularly, as well as social events. One of the areas we would like to address is the gender imbalance and gender bias in technology, which is critical as tech increasingly envelops every aspect of daily life. 

Personally, I am passionate about technology and problem solving with impact, and highly appreciate the opportunities to meet and learn from amazing people working on things as varied as robotics, blockchain, gravitation, healthcare and consumer technology. I love being part of IIT AGNE and working closely with the many members from multiple generations, who are accomplished and do so much.

The conference, titled "Leadership Conference 2020" is a one day conference with tagline  "Reimagining Healthcare Through Innovation". It is focused on a critical issue in healthcare - there is plenty of technology that is making its way into the healthcare system, but has not helped as much, and in fact has caused many problems. 

For example, physicians spend more of their time filling out patient records on their systems systems than with their patients, causing burnout and mental issues. Other issues are poor usability at point of care and experience, complexity, multiple systems lacking interoperability. Also, there is huge amounts of data being generated within the system, but is it being used in the right way to drive critical decision making?  How about all the healthcare data from our personal devices (for example Fitbit) -  is it secure and are we getting the full benefit as individuals and as a society? For technologists working on solutions, the healthcare system is very labyrinthine with no clear pathways to get innovative products to adoption. Can new healthcare policies and procedures be developed to break barriers to innovation? Other questions are: can technology be used to drive down costs and still ensure high quality? Can new technologies like AI (Artificial Intelligence) enable technology to be a true partner and assistant? 

The conference is going to focus on these questions, and will have three tracks: Technology and Innovation in Healthcare, Rethinking Policies and Processes; and Towards a Data Driven Culture. It will bring together   healthcare professionals, policy makers, data scientists/analysts and technology professionals. In addition to keynote speeches and panel discussions, brainstorming sessions for the attendees to participate in the discussion, and to synthesize and surface new ideas.

This started from several discussions with Dr. Jatin Dave, who is CMO of Compass Health over the years. He deals with all of these issues, and was asking many of these questions. My wife, Sumitha Mathur, has been working as a data analyst at several hospitals, and she has been talking about them on a daily basis. Another friend, Jayanthi Narasimhan, CEO of WatchRx, has been working on a watch for geriatric patients and has encountered many barriers to getting her technology through the systems. Hence I suggested this to the members last year, and IIT AGNE decided to take this up as a topic for a conference. We are very fortunate to have Dr. Jatin Dave and Dr. Dhrumil Shah, President of IMANE, who are working closely with us. 

We are looking for those who are thinking about or working on these issues in and around the healthcare system - physicians, data scientists, analysts and technology professionals. If you have insights, contacts or suggestions to offer, or would like to participate in and attend the conference, we would like to hear from you.

Thank you for your time and attention!