NEA is known in close circles of the venture capital world as a preeminent firm. It was founded in 1978 and to date has managed over $20 billion in capital invested in early stage and growth stage private companies. The firm has a track record of hiring the best and the brightest.
It recently announced it was bringing on board two venture advisors. Typically venture advisors can play a variety of roles within venture capital firms. Because of their strong and long standing professional networks they have intimate knowledge of and relationships with CEOs and key executives of the most promising private companies spanning startups to established fast growing enterprises.
In addition, venture advisors have the ability to impart wisdom on how to improve operations as well as higher level strategy on product improvements, product pricing or nascent markets about to break out. They can also serve as a mechanism to recruit top talent to a portfolio company or work across portfolio companies to reduce costs.
The two prominent individuals joining NEA are Alan Muney, MD, MHA and Ross Jaffe, MD. Dr. Muney will assist NEA’s healthcare services portfolio companies while Dr. Jaffe will be dedicated to the firm’s medical devices and health tech endeavors.
Dr. Muney joins NEA from Cigna, where he served as the Chief Medical Officer and as the Executive Vice President of Total Health and Network. Prior to Cigna, Dr. Muney was an Executive Director in the Private Equity Group at The Blackstone Group, and the CEO of Equity Healthcare, which he founded to manage the healthcare costs of Blackstone's portfolio companies. He previously served as Executive Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of Oxford Health Plans, Chief Medical Officer of United Healthcare’s Northeast region, Senior Vice President and Chief Medical officer for Avanti Health systems, and Regional Medical Director for Mullikin Medical Centers in California.
“Dr. Muney’s impressive experience covers a multitude of facets across the managed care landscape.” said Mohamad Makhzoumi, General Partner and Head of Healthcare Services and Healthcare IT Investing at NEA. “At NEA, we pride ourselves on our extensive network of resources, and Dr. Muney’s expertise in business development, program management, and employer health benefit design, combined with his ability to manage relationships between healthcare professional, regulators, and media will be invaluable to the NEA portfolio. We’re thrilled to formalize our relationship with Dr. Muney and to officially welcome him as an NEA Venture Advisor.”
Dr. Jaffe joins NEA from Versant Ventures, where he was one of the founders and a Managing Director. He has spent the past twenty years investing primarily in medical devices. Prior to founding Versant Ventures, Dr. Jaffe was a General Partner at Brentwood Venture Capital, where he led investments in medical device, drug delivery, biotechnology, healthcare services, and healthcare information system companies. He earned a BA in Policy Studies from Dartmouth, an MD from Johns Hopkins, and an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, and completed his medical training and served as an attending physician at the University of California, San Francisco.
“We’ve had the pleasure of working with Dr. Jaffe for quite some time as a co-investor and fellow board member,” said Dr. Josh Makower, General Partner and Head of Medical Device and Healthtech investing at NEA. “Dr. Jaffe’s deep roots within the Medtech investing ecosystem and leadership role improving regulatory and reimbursement processes in the US make him an excellent partner in advancing our current projects as well as helping us identify new transformative medical device investments. We are honored to have Dr. Jaffe join us as a Venture Advisor and look forward to the value he will add to both our investment team and medical device portfolio companies.”
