Victor is being built by surgeons, engineers, scientists, designers, regulatory specialists and commercial leaders, working together rather than in sequence.
Manios Dimitrakakis obtained a combined BA and MEng in Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Patras, with his Master's thesis subject being the development of a novel robotic manipulator for thoracic surgery. He then went on to do a PhD in University College London Computer Science on the development of handheld robotic devices for minimally invasive neurosurgery. To translate the technology he developed during his PhD into the operating theatre, he co-founded Panda Surgical, a UCL spinout, alongside his PhD supervisors UCL CS Prof. Danail Stoyanov and UCLH neurosurgeon Mr. Hani Marcus. Since May 2023, he has been leading the effort at Panda Surgical as the company's CEO.
Hani Marcus is Professor of Neurosurgery at the UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology and a consultant neurosurgeon at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery. He specialises in minimally invasive approaches to brain and skull base tumours and has led related international guidelines. He was awarded a PhD from Imperial College London for his work on surgical robotics and now leads research focused on robotics and artificial intelligence. His group has attracted substantial research funding, produced more than 250 peer-reviewed publications, and contributed to major frameworks for surgical innovation, including the IDEAL framework on surgical robotics. He was also editor of the first book dedicated to neurosurgical robotics, and his work has been recognised through visits from Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal and the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology. He co-founded Panda Surgical to help bring these technologies into everyday surgical practice.
Dan Stoyanov is a Professor of Robot Vision in UCL Computer Science, Co-Director of the UCL Hawkes Institute, and Royal Academy of Engineering Chair in Emerging Technologies. His background and research interests are in the fields of surgical robotics and AI where he has co-authored over 500 papers and is co-inventor on over 70 patent applications. He is elected Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineering (FIEEE); Fellow of the Institute of Engineering and Technology (FIET); Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering (FREng); and Fellow of the MICCAI Society (FMICCAI). Dan is also Chief Scientist at Medtronic Surgical R&D, and co-founder of Odin Vision Ltd (an Olympus Corporation Company), both companies specialising in developing AI products for interventional healthcare.
George Dwyer is the Tech Lead at Panda Surgical, where he leads technical development of the handheld robotic system. He holds a BEng in Medical Engineering from Swansea University, an MRes in Medical Robotics from Imperial College London, and an MRes in Medical Imaging from University College London. Furthermore, he has a PhD in Surgical Robotics from UCL, where he developed robotic endoscopes for fetal surgery. After his PhD, George has worked on a multitude of robotics projects, including a micro-tissue dissection system, a robotic milling system and implant fabrication as part of his UCL EPSRC doctoral prize fellowship.
Dimitris is a Senior Software Engineer at Panda Surgical, holding a bachelor's degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering and a master's in Control Systems from University of Patras, and also a Ph.D. on Artificial Intelligence in robotic surgery from UCL Computer Science. Throughout his doctoral research, Dimitris specialized in surgical vision algorithms for depth perception, scene segmentation, scene synthesis, and developed several publicly available surgical video datasets. At Panda Surgical, Dimitris focuses on developing the software for our robotic devices. Leveraging his specialized background, he also spearheaded the development of complementary AI components for the system, including real-time anatomy segmentation and surgery phase recognition.
Sam is a Senior Mechanical Engineer at Panda Surgical with experience spanning large-scale surgical robotics companies and early-stage medtech startups. Previously, working at CMR Surgical, Sam led mechanical design improvements for robotic instruments from concept through to manufacture. He later joined Orthonika, a medical device startup developing an implantable device, where he led multiple pre-clinical workstreams across engineering development, prototyping to regulatory strategy and First-in-Human preparation. Sam holds an MEng in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Warwick.
Keshav Iyengar is a skilled R&D Engineer at Panda Surgical, bringing a wealth of engineering experience in academia and industry. For his Ph.D. in Robotics and AI, Keshav investigated deep reinforcement learning for concentric tube robots in medical interventions focusing on the simulation to reality gap with publications in ICRA, RA-L, TMRB, and IJCARS. Prior, Keshav completed his MSc. in Robotics and Computation at UCL and his undergrad BASc. in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Waterloo where his final year design project was a retrofittable beer pouring system. During his undergrad, he was also the Team Lead for the Unversity Robotics Team. He has also had industry experience as an engineer at Avidbots Corp., Amphenol Canada Corp, and Mackie Moving Systems.
Iliana is a skilled bioengineer with a combined Bachelor and Master of Engineering in Molecular Bioengineering from Imperial College London. She has a strong background in medical device development, having successfully designed and implemented innovative solutions in diagnostic devices. Iliana ensures compliance with FDA, Health and Safety Legislation, and ISO13485 standards, demonstrating her commitment to regulatory excellence. At Panda Surgical, she leverages her expertise as a Quality Engineer to drive advancements in the medical field, focusing on the highest standards of quality and safety in surgical products through cutting-edge technology and rigorous quality control processes. Iliana is dedicated to improving patient outcomes by continually enhancing product performance and reliability.
George is an Embedded Software Engineer at Panda Surgical, contributing almost 2 decades of programming experience, and expertise in robotics, computer vision, and AI. He has a PhD in Biomedical Engineering from King's College London and has published in top-tier conferences and journals, including ICRA and Soft Robotics, collaborated extensively with IBM, and been granted an international patent for his research. He was the founding software engineer for the robotic colonoscope, MorphGI, developing the robot from proof of concept to pre-clinical trials. George was also the project manager and lead engineer for the surgical endoscopy robot, microDART, and collaborated with Ericsson and China Mobile to operate it teleoperatively over 5G. He has demonstrated this robot at numerous high-profile events in India, China, Spain, and England, including to the late Queen. microDART has been featured in the Financial Times, BBC, and more.
Craig is a recognised leader in medical technology with more than 25 years of experience building and scaling global technology organisations. He currently serves as the Chief Executive Officer of OrganOx, an Oxford University spinout transforming liver transplantation, leading the company from pre-revenue to a $1.5B acquisition by the Japanese medical device manufacturer Terumo Corporation. Prior to joining OrganOx in 2016, Craig served as managing director at Siemens Magnet Technology and simultaneously acted as an executive member of the Siemens Healthcare MRI business between 2010 and 2016. In addition, he has held positions at Oxford Instruments, Amersham Plc and GE Healthcare in a variety of management and leadership roles within the in vivo diagnostics sector.
Jeffery Alvarez is a Board Director and the Chief Strategy Officer at Moon Surgical, where he works cross-functionally to define its corporate strategy and helps craft its vision of the future. Defining, building, and delivering value in healthcare has been his passion and specialty over the past 20 years. He led product management at Auris Health, where he defined their early endoluminal robotics platform, Hansen Medical and their robotic vascular system, and dozens of other medical devices. Jeffery holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and an MBA from the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley. He believes the future of healthcare is in efficiency, where effective therapy can be delivered in less time, with less training, and fewer resources. And he is passionate about working to make that future happen at Moon Surgical.
Hector is a clinician-turned venture investor specialising in life-science university spinouts. At Oxford Investment Consultants (OIC) he focuses on research-driven investment opportunities and supports a number of spinouts via board roles. Hector previously practised medicine in the NHS and holds a BMBS in Medicine and a BMedSci in Medical Sciences from the University of Nottingham.
Sampson Lau is a Board Member and President at PrimaNova Technologies Limited, a platform developing and commercializing a pipeline of next generation neurosurgical medical devices. Backed by a global team of neurosurgeons and engineers, and with offerings across neuro monitoring, CSF management, and surgical tools, the mission is to significantly enhance patient care in the underserved neurosurgical segment, relentlessly improving patients’ survival and disability. Sampson has prior experience in life sciences venture capital and strategic investment, private equity, and mergers and acquisitions transactions, across the US and APAC markets. He holds a BA in Economics from the University of Chicago.
David Noonan earned a B.Eng in Mechatronics Engineering from Dublin City University, an M.Sc in Mechanical Engineering from King's College London, and a Ph.D. from Imperial College London. He worked on Image Guided Robotics and Fiber Optic RealShape (FORS) technology as a Research Scientist at Philips Research North America before joining Auris Health in 2015. At Auris Health (acquired by Johnson & Johnson in 2019), Noonan was the Senior Director of Systems, Algorithms and Robotics where he helped lead the development of the Monarch Platform, the first robotic system for peripheral nodule bronchoscopy. In 2020, he joined Moon Surgical as Chief Technology Officer to lead the development of the Maestro System.
We welcome conversations with clinicians, hospitals, researchers, patient organisations and partners who share our ambition.
