Meet Vibrent’s
leadership team

Praduman Jain

Chief Executive Officer

Praduman Jain, known to colleagues as “PJ,” is CEO and Founder of Vibrent Health and the Principal Investigator of the Participant Technology Systems Center of the National Institutes of Health’s All of Us Research Program. Under Jain’s leadership, the NIH awarded Vibrent $75 million in 2017 and an additional award in 2020, with initial first-year funding of $39 million, to build and manage a national platform for health research for one million people across the U.S. over the program’s expected span of 10 or more years. In 2020, Vibrent received more than $4 million in funds from NIH to build next-generation technology for COVID-19 screening, testing and contact tracing. Jain is also the Chair of the Security Board of the Committee on Access, Privacy & Security for the NIH All of Us Research Program; a member of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Roundtable on Genomics and Precision Health; an invited external expert for eMERGE & Beyond, The Future of Electronic Medical Records and Genomics program of the Division of Genomic Medicine, National Human Genome Research Institute; and an external advisory board member for iTHRIVE – a Virginia Clinical and Translational Science Award. Prior to founding Vibrent, Jain held various senior leadership roles at Sprint, Nextel, AOL, Time Warner, and VTech and launched emerging products and services with revenues of more than $2 billion. He earned a Master of Science in electrical engineering, holds several patents and has authored several research publications.

Dave Klein

Chief Product Officer

Dave focuses on products that sit at the intersection of technology, science and health. He leads a diverse set of functions including product management, data analytics, user experience design, user research, science communications and digital health programs. He is also a Principal Investigator of the National Institutes of Health’s Precision Medicine Initiative/All of Us Research Program, focusing on product innovation and product management. Prior to coming to Vibrent Health, Dave led the development of products that improve the lives of individuals and families at large companies such as Virgin Mobile, Nextel, Sprint, Time Warner Cable and innovative technology startups. He has a track record of being a thought leader and product innovator including bringing the first ever mobile video chat to market through a major US carrier (Sprint HTC Evo smartphone) and leading the first global consumer voice-over-IP product. Dave passionately believes in the power of technology to help people take control of their own health.

Neeta Jain

Chief Technology Officer

Since joining the company in 2012, Neeta has spearheaded research and development efforts and helped Vibrent achieve critical certifications like FISMA, ISO 13485, ISO 9001 and SSAE 16. In addition, she has contributed to the company’s rapid domestic and international expansion, helping to grow Vibrent’s workforce by five times its original size in her first five years as CTO. She is also a Principal Investigator of the National Institutes of Health’s Precision Medicine Initiative/All of Us Research Program. Jain’s work was foundational in the creation of the Vibrent Research Platform, Vibrent’s premiere Software as a Service platform used by researchers, medical device companies, body sensor companies, payers and government customers for diagnostics, wellness, home care, disease management, mobile surveys, self-management, medication adherence and surveillance for all of Vibrent’s customizable health programs. Using the VRP, mobile platforms and intelligent applications, Vibrent helps transform perceived obstacles into achievable goals to drive innovation in health care. The VRP, which enables longitudinal data collection, engagement and insights, was selected by the National Institutes of Health as the participant-facing technology platform for the Precision Medicine Initiative/All of Us Research Program. The program, unprecedented in scope, aims to engage one million people across the U.S. over 10 or more years to accelerate discoveries and advance precision medicine. Vibrent is helping translate participants’ behavioral, lifestyle, environmental and genomics data into actionable insights for individuals and populations. Prior to joining Vibrent, Neeta architected large and mission-critical systems at the Internal Revenue Service and Honeywell, applying her expertise in dot.net, Java and Web development. Her passion for precision medicine combined with her desire to make a difference in public health led her to Vibrent. Neeta is a member of Mindshare, an organization of C-suite executives from high tech emerging growth companies supporting innovation and entrepreneurship in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. An advocate for STEM education, Neeta helped launch a nonprofit called FIDA to help underprivileged children attend college in India and is passionate about advancing women in the technology field.

Jason Cao

Chief Architect

Jason graduated from university of Maryland with a master degree in computer science with a concentration in Artificial Intelligence. With many publications and patents under his name, Jason is well-versed in many of the latest IT technologies and considers himself a life-long student of technology more than anything else. Before joining Vibrent Health, for more than 15 years, he has designed, architected and implemented various software applications and systems ranging from state-of-art bio defense system for fortune 100 company to gaming application for startups with less than 10 employees. After joining Vibrent Health as the chief architect, Jason architected and designed the latest Vibrent’s Software as a Service (SaaS) Learning Health System which powers numerous fully customized health programs that study health contexts and disseminate advocacy, behavior, and clinical programs including the Precision Medicine Initiative (PMI)

Mark Begale

Vice President

Mark identifies and nurtures new opportunities and collaborations with companies and organizations to form relationships between these entities and Vibrent Health for mutual benefit, in support Vibrent’s strategic vision and business outcomes. He has held leadership positions product partnerships and technology as director of products and chief technology officer for Center for Behavioral Intervention Technologies. He is also a Principal Investigator of the National Institutes of Health’s Precision Medicine Initiative/All of Us Research Program. He holds a degree from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Mark has a strong in strong interest in precision medicine and is dedicated to his work at Vibrent because of his desire to help others.

Josh Schilling

Sr. Director, Health Solutions

Josh has more than 15 years of expertise in medical devices system design, product design, and development of both hardware and software solutions in the health industry. As a scientist and engineer, Josh is passionate about using sensors of all types from physiological personal health technology to environmental and passive sensing as a means to infer and improve the quality of life for everyonethrough solutions that anyone can afford.

Through ongoing engineering efforts, he has directly contributed to the continued improvement of Bluetooth technology while working with health device manufactures and standards bodies, to improve the technology's usefulness within the medical community. Early in his career, he developed Pulse Oximeter hardware/firmware to measure oxygenated blood found on oxygen bound to hemoglobin molecules in red blood cells. Some of his achievements include authorship of papers accepted into the IEEE, poster presentations at ATA, and several pending patents.

Josh has contributed to technological and scientific advancements at organizations including ContinuaHealth Alliance, Bluetooth SIG, USB I/F, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and various societies within IEEE, Society of Behavioral Medicine (SBM), and American TelemedicineAssociation (ATA). Josh works with Vibrent’s medical partners to give back to the medical community by helping them adopt advancements and knowledge learned from Vibrent into their solutions while conforming to guidance set by international standards for medical devices (IEC 60601) and medical device software (IEC 62304).

Scott Sutherland

Vice President, Data Science

Scott Sutherland is a software engineer and data scientist, with two decades of experience in health research informatics. He has managed data science, software development, data management, and scientific survey projects in biotech, clinical care, and for biomedical research institutions, including the Broad Institute of MIT & Harvard, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, and the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. He has worked on several large-cohort studies, including the National Institutes of Health’s Precision Medicine Initiative/All of Us Research Program, where he is a Principal Investigator, and the Women’s Health Initiative. Scott received his bachelor’s degree from The Ohio State University in 1995, by combining graduate and undergraduate courses in Computer Science and other disciplines for a one-of-a-kind degree in Interactive Media (web application development). He went on to become a faculty member in the Masters of Science program at the Purdue University School of Engineering, and Indiana University School of Informatics, helping found a new program and teaching a variety of courses related to development of internet-based applications. At the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the Broad Institute of MIT & Harvard, Scott built and managed departments that served hundreds of cancer, rare disease, HIV, and public health studies. His domain has included many software engineering teams, a survey research call center, a data center, an analytics team, and a creative services team to help scientific projects accomplish their communications goals. Sutherland directed design and development of numerous scientific portals and patent-facing, web-based disease registries for cancer, heart disease, and rare disease studies. In addition, he has also been a PI for individual disease registries and served on IRB committees at two different institutions. While at the Broad Institute, Scott started and managed Operations Analytics for the All of Us Research Program. At Vibrent Health, Scott serves as Vice President for Data Science. He serves as the Principal Investigator for Analytics in the PTSC for the All of Us Research Program. He has built and managed Vibrent’s analytics team and directed strategy for the Analytics platform, reporting and services.

Medhavi Bhatia

Vice President, Engineering

Medhavi has an extensive background in product inception and development for various engineering organizations including hCentive, 3CLogic and GENBAND. In his role at Vibrent Health, Medhavi manages local and remote engineering and product development teams to create and drive Vibrent’s product roadmaps through a fast, agile and reliable delivery process. Ardent about creating, sustaining and managing innovation, Medhavi holds several patents and has authored internet standards that led to the creation of several new products in the telecommunications industry. He was also the architect behind the creation of several distributed cloud-based technologies now used in the contact center industry and collaborated with the University of Maryland on a research grant applied to 3CLogic products. Additionally, he was part of the team that created, managed and worked with several health care exchanges including the Massachusetts Health Connector and HealthCare.gov. He holds a Bachelor of Science from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, India’s top institution for engineering and computer science; a Master of Science from the University of Pennsylvania; and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Maryland. Medhavi is passionate about his contribution towards improvements in collection and management of health information and data and ultimately, in research and precision health.

Dean Heistad

Vice President, Technology Operations

Dean is an experienced technology leader, with 25 years of experience in various industries, from Silicon Valley to Silicon Alley, to the Bio Beltway, bringing innovation, disruption and leadership to the organization. At Vibrent, Dean is responsible for technology operations, which includes cloud architectures and operations defining technical requirements for scalable, secure, high quality and efficient systems used within the company and by external users. With a focus on automation, Dean applies complex technical concepts and the latest tools and technologies to guide operational teams across project phases throughout development, testing and implementation stages. Dean’s career spans from the days of Apple II computers on desktops to building and managing large-scale server farms, out-sourcing to cloud providers and ultimately constructing serverless-based systems that are highly available, high quality, secure, cost-effective and customer-centric. He has a diverse background working with large companies such as Time Warner, AARP and IBM, and successful startup companies like Infoseek and Livedeal. Dean is a graduate of Clemson University with a computer science degree and a minor in business. In his personal life, Dean is an avid pilot and animal rescue advocate. He brings his passion for the two by volunteering his time with Angelflight and Pilots N Paws, where he flies patients in need of medical services to their locations and rescues dogs from shelters, transporting them to safe, new locations.

Kent Lockhart

Vice President, Consumer Products

Kent has over 30 years of experience working in the federal, finance and health care industries to define business and IT strategies, products, architectures and transformation roadmaps. He has served the health care industry since 2009 and during this time, focused on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and led product delivery initiatives for the public and private health care marketplaces. In his role at Vibrent Health, Kent oversees teams responsible for consumer engagement, survey tools for gathering participant provided information (PPI), digital health technology (DHT) and data exchange products. While remaining focused on scalability, Kent leads product delivery teams to improve our products’ flexibility, stabilize platform features, refine data management strategies and improve operational efficiency. Kent holds a master’s degree in computer science from George Washington University and degrees in economics and computer science from Virginia Tech. He is passionate about the growing role technology plays in precision medicine.

Rachele Peterson

Director, Clinical Research

Rachele has more than 15 years of experience in clinical research and research administration, bringing to Vibrent firsthand knowledge and understanding of the needs of investigators and research teams. Most recently, she was the Executive Director and Principal Investigator of the All of Us Research Program at the University of Arizona and Banner Health where she led award management, milestone adherence, relationship stewardship, communications, research compliance and fiscal management. Rachele successfully harmonized 130 research staff across 14 enrollment sites in two states to ensure program goals and milestones were achieved using standardized operations, enrolling over 38,500 participants from diverse communities. Rachele is the primary leader engaging with Healthcare Provider Organizations in the All of Us Research Program, guiding cross-functional and strategic efforts to position and manage the Participant Technology Systems Center needs around policy development, customer support and engagement, and quality improvement. She identifies opportunities for Vibrent platform offerings and builds industry-academic relationships. As a lifelong learner focused on continuous improvement and innovation, Rachele holds a Master of Science in clinical research management from Arizona State University and is presently completing an Executive MBA at her alma mater. She has a Bachelor of Arts in public policy analysis from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She maintains two professional, national certifications as a Certified Research Administrator and Certified Clinical Research Professional.

Cecilia Gacek

Director, Quality Assurance

Cecilia lives and breathes Quality Assurance. She has a deep understanding of how to identify risks in all aspects of the Vibrent platform and applications. Cecilia is a strategic thinker who uses a blend of manual and automation testing to identify problems as early as possible. She has gained this wisdom through 3 decades of testing and developing software applications in commercial, government and health research industries. She keeps up to date with latest automation and development technologies to help speed up the testing cycles while delivering high quality applications to production. Cecilia mentors and develops strong QA engineers who fiercely defend the quality of the features developed in agile scrum teams. She imbues the QA defenders with her passion to deliver the best quality on time. Cecilia defines the vision and mission for Quality Assurance at Vibrent Health. Cecilia is a graduate of Brown University with a degree in Computer Science and Fine Arts.

Sameer Siddiqui

Vice President, Enterprise Products

Sameer is a seasoned leader in product development and management with extensive hands-on expertise in building consumer-facing products for B2C and B2B markets. He has a strong background in taking digital products to market and to large user audiences in various verticals. At Vibrent, Sameer leads product teams and institutes processes to align product and engineering departments, using Agile methodology to produce stable product features on multiple web and native mobile platforms. Sameer manages the complete lifecycle of Vibrent’s products, including story-boarding product features, creating roadmaps, sprint planning, backlog grooming, utilizing SCRUM-related product assets and conducting market analysis to produce scalable, web-based and mobile products. Sameer has led product management for various businesses including healthcare, e-commerce, customer service, collaboration, messaging, matchmaking and marketplaces. Previously, Sameer served as Senior Director of Product Management at Contact Solution, acquired by Verint, where he sold to customers including GEICO, Boston Globe & Seattle Times; as Senior Director of Products and Social Commerce at Gannett, where he built Gannett’s daily deal e-commerce product, expanding from three cities to a nationwide deployment; and he served as Co-Founder and Vice President of Product for Naseeb Network, where he gained thousands of recurring enterprise clients for his product lines. Sameer holds a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from the University of Alabama and a Master of Business Administration from George Mason University.

Catherine Freeland

Director, Health Research Communications

Catherine brings broad healthcare marketing communications experience and a passion for public health to Vibrent Health. She has more than15 years’ experience leading communications strategy for major academic medical centers in New York City and Denver, Colorado. She most recently served as the communications officer for the All of Us Research Program New York City Consortium. Catherine successfully deployed paid digital and social advertising, outdoor placements, direct mail, email, and SMS campaigns to recruit and retain nearly 26,000 NYC participants across the NYC Consortium. With a strong focus on inclusion for underrepresented communities in biomedical research, Catherine is committed through her work at Vibrent to securing the improved health and vitality of marginalized communities through increased accessibility and equity. Catherine has extensive experience leading institution-wide initiatives including the implementation of content management systems, customer relationship management tools, and digital asset management. Her work in both the public and private sector includes developing and implementing public health campaigns on issues such as child abuse and neglect prevention, smoking cessation, and public health funding. She has experience interfacing with federal, state, and local governments to implement public health campaigns and initiatives. Catherine received her Master’s in Public Health from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health. A native of Colorado, Catherine and her family live in Washington Heights in NYC.

Lisa Kunst

Director, Digital Health Solutions

As the leader of the Vibrent Digital Health Solutions team, Lisa uses her 15+ years of professional project/program management experience in precision medicine research, healthcare, and information system implementations to help our research partners succeed. Her group works closely with our partners to kick off projects, implement protocols, launch research projects and provide continued consulting services to help researchers and study staff achieve their scientific and operational goals. Much of Lisa’s career has focused on reducing health disparities in underserved populations. Prior to joining Vibrent, Lisa was the Administrative Director for the All of Us Research Program’s Wisconsin consortium, based out of Marshfield Clinic Research Institute. She provided oversight of the statewide implementation and operations of All of Us, working with partners at UW-Madison, Froedtert and the Medical College of Wisconsin, and Gundersen Health, as well as providing leadership for All of Us teams located at multiple Marshfield Clinic Health System locations. Lisa has significant expertise in all aspects of the lifecycle of clinical research, including award management, IRB communication, community engagement, enrollment, and participant retention, successfully leading the consortium to enroll over 12,500 participants with an exceptional rate of 68% of participants remaining actively engaged. Lisa earned a master’s degree in Administrative Studies from Missouri State University and also has been a certified Project Management Professional (PMP) through the Project Management Institute since 2016.

Chris Warfield

Director, Program Management and Operations

Chris has 20 years of experience in a wide range of system development life cycle tasks including project management, financial management, member management, quality assurance and customer support. He has helped lead companies including CGI Federal, Booz Allen Hamilton, Meridian Knowledge Solutions and CACI in achieving the development and delivery of systems to support customer needs. At Vibrent, Chris leverage’s his background and expertise in people and customer management to organize and oversee the daily operations of the company and provide projects with actionable solutions. As Vibrent’s director of Program Management and Operations, Chris oversees one of Vibrent’s largest programs, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) All of Us Research Program, for which he manages the delivery metrics of the Vibrent Research Platform (VRP) and all interactions and requests from NIH. He also monitors the progress and development towards reaching clients’ goals and client satisfaction and oversees multiple project managers and teams. In addition to his Bachelor of Science degree in Integrative Studies with a concentration in Business Administration from George Mason University, Chris is a Certified ScrumMaster® and holds several certifications in technology and business administration. In his free time, Chris enjoys sports and fitness activities as well as spending time with his wife Ashley and his two sons, Asher and Christian. Chris is passionate about the impact that digital health technologies will have on the future of medicine and hopes he can be a small piece of how this could change the future of health moving forward.

K. Pearson Brown

Director, Communications

Pearson directs Vibrent’s internal and external communications programs, including media relations, digital content creation and distribution, events production, and company messaging and branding activities. Pearson has more than 20 years of experience in technology and health care communications and marketing for technology companies, medical organizations, medical device manufacturers, hospitals, pharmaceuticals, and health and wellness companies. She has directed communications programs for YouTube, Sony, USC Viterbi School of Engineering, Tenet Health Systems, Ibotta, Pharmavite/NatureMade, American Heart Association, Vitamin Shoppe, Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, and American Physical Therapy Association. Previously Pearson served as Vice President of HealthWell PR, Vice President of PMBC Group, Vice President of WorldBed Studios, Director of Technology and Digital Lifestyle for Allison & Partners/Los Angeles, and Director of Health Care for CarryOn Communication. Pearson holds a Bachelor of Arts in English and Communications Arts from James Madison University and is a graduate of the American University Film & Video Institute. She enjoys blogging about technology and lifestyle topics and working with the media to get the word out about inspiring and life-changing technology and health stories.

Brandon Beltz, PhD

Director, UX Research

Brandon has 15 years of experience conducting user research and working in research laboratories. He is driven by a desire to understand how the fundamentals of human behavior impact the successful adoption and use of information technology. As the Director of User Research at Vibrent Health, Brandon establishes best practices, guidelines, and policies for conducting user research within the company and with partners. He provides overall company strategy and direction for user research efforts across multiple product lines and with different user populations. In two years, he has led and conducted over 35 user research studies using quantitative and qualitative approaches to deliver data driven insights to better shape product designs.

George Uzzle

Information System Security Manager

A dedicated and result oriented security leader with over 30 years’ of experience in the Information Technology industry focusing on security and privacy risks. Proven design and operational expertise for securing large scale systems/applications and infrastructure for clients spanning US federal agencies and commercial entities such as hospitals, scientific/research communities, and cloud service providers. The diverse experience and expertise allow me to provide a strategic roadmap and operational leadership needed to counter the ever-evolving security risk of the Participant Technologies Systems Center (PTSC).

Norm Villacorte

Director, Implementation Services

Norm is a results-driven Information Technology leader with over 25 years of IT Implementations, Shared Services, Enterprise Project Management, Strategic Planning & Business Relationship Management, Organizational Change Management, Resource & Vendor Management, Business Analysis and Quality Assurance & Testing. As head of the Implementation Services Group, Norm provides leadership on Platform Configurations Management, Marketing Operations, Data Migrations, Partner On-Boarding UAT, and Change Control Board. Since the public launch of the All of Us Research Program in 2018, the Implementations teams have successfully developed and released over 230 releases, delivering new Participant Provided Information (PPI) modules and surveys, new COVID-19 surveys, Snap Questions, as well implementing major initiatives such as Salivary, Genomics, and Serology. Prior to joining Vibrent Health, Norm has worked in both in the private and public sectors, building and managing multiple IT functions, and establishing service-oriented and delivery teams, in organizations such as Rally Health, Department of Homeland Security, Amtrak, and United Airlines. Norm holds a BS in Operations Management and Information Systems from Northern Illinois University and a MBA in Information Systems from Lewis University. Norm also has certifications in Project Management (PMP) and IT Service Management.

Matthew Mitchell

Director, People and Culture

Matthew leads the People Team at Vibrent Health, creating a culture of engagement and recognition for our people while providing strategic planning and guidance for our business. Matthew has 10 years of experience in the Washington area helping small businesses grow, implementing new technology to increase efficiency, engagement, and recognition, including time at the National Institutes of Health where he focused on hiring for positions across all institutes. As a lifelong learner he strives to build a culture of learning at Vibrent, helping our people grow their skills and be their best. Matthew believes speed and talent are key factors that will continue to differentiate Vibrent from our competitors and attracting and retaining the best talent is a constant priority. Prior to joining Vibrent Health, Matthew served as the Director of Human Resources at Lansinoh Laboratories in Alexandria, VA, where he integrated numerous systems into one fully mobile platform and significantly increased employee engagement and development opportunities. Matthew holds a Master’s degree from the University of Alabama and is certified as a Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR) and SHRM Certified Professional (SHRM-CP). In his free time Matthew enjoys sea kayaking, golf, cheering the Crimson Tide, and finding good bagels.