Executive Leadership

Vladimir Makatsaria is Chief Executive Officer and Board Member of LivaNova. He joined the company in March 2024.
 
Building great teams and driving innovation in the healthcare field has been Makatsaria’s focus throughout his entire career. Prior to LivaNova, he worked for 27 years at Johnson & Johnson (J&J) in executive leadership roles, spanning various technologies and geographies. He most recently served as Company Group Chairman at J&J MedTech where he led Ethicon, a global leader in the surgical technologies market. Other executive positions throughout his J&J tenure include: leading J&J China, J&J MedTech APAC, Ethicon EMEA, among others. He also served on Ethicon, DePuy and total MedTech global leadership teams.
 
Vladimir is currently a member of Advanced Medical Technology Association (AdvaMed) Board of Directors and Americares Board of Directors. He served as Chairman of the Board of the Asia Pacific Medical Technology Association (APACMed) and as an Advisory Board Member to Singapore Management University.
 
Makatsaria holds a Bachelor of Arts in Physiology, a Masters in Business Administration, and a Masters in Healthcare Administration from the University of Minnesota.

Stephanie Bolton is President, Global Epilepsy and previously served as President of LivaNova’s International Region. Bolton joined Cyberonics, a LivaNova legacy company, in 2011, where she moved into sales leadership roles and served as Vice President for multiple European markets. She also spent eight years in the pharmaceutical industry at UCB, Otsuka Pharmaceuticals and Sankyo Pharma.

Ensuring equitable patient access to the latest healthcare technologies is Bolton’s driving force. As Vice Chair of the Association of British HealthTech Industries, she advocates for sector innovation with government stakeholders. Bolton is active in several women’s network and mentoring groups, and is known for cultivating an open, supportive culture that emphasizes diversity and inclusion.

Bolton graduated with honors from Coventry University with a degree in physiology.

Michael Hutchinson joined LivaNova in November 2022 and is responsible for the global legal, compliance and corporate governance functions. Hutchinson has more than 20 years of experience as an attorney, advisor and business leader, including more than a decade of leadership and management experience with life science companies such as Stryker Corporation and Varian Medical Solutions. He has built and led high-performing, diverse and proactive global teams and has successfully managed a broad range of legal and business issues, including complex litigation, ESG matters, M&A and government investigations. Hutchinson began his law career working in private practice.

Hutchinson holds a Juris Doctor degree from The George Washington University Law School and a Bachelor of Arts from Clark University.

Philip Kowalczyk is Chief Strategy and Corporate Development Officer for LivaNova. He joined the company in August 2024. 

Kowalczyk possesses an extensive background in creating and executing strategies across the medtech industry. Prior to joining LivaNova, he spent 16 years at Johnson & Johnson (J&J) Medtech, where he served on the global leadership teams for both the Vision and Ethicon subsidiaries. He served as the Vice President of Business Development-Vision, as well as the Head of Asia Pacific Strategy and Business Development in Singapore. In this latter role, Kowalczyk led teams responsible for developing and executing regional inorganic initiatives, integrating global acquisitions across Asia Pacific, and generating business insights in the region. For Ethicon, he was Head of Global Strategy, Insights & Pricing, as well as Business Development Director. 

He earned a bachelor’s degree in politics from Princeton University and holds an MBA in finance and strategy from University of Michigan’s Stephen M. Ross School of Business.

 

Sujay Mashru is Vice President of Asia Pacific (APAC) and Growth Markets, where he leads all commercial activities for the APAC, Middle East, Africa, Russia and Latin American regions. Previously, he served as Vice President of APAC for LivaNova, overseeing the rapid expansion of the business in more than 20 countries.

Mashru joined LivaNova in 2012 as part of the Corporate Development team, focusing on corporate strategic planning, mergers and acquisitions. In 2015, he became Vice President of Commercial Operations for the International Region, where he managed business transformation projects, commercial strategy, channel partner management and commercial excellence for all business units. Before joining LivaNova, Mashru spent seven years with Medtronic in its Cardiac Rhythm Disease Management division in commercial and engineering roles.

Mashru earned a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from Purdue University and a MBA from INSEAD (Institut Européen d'Administration des Affaires).

Franco Poletti is the President of LivaNova’s Cardiopulmonary Business Unit. Poletti joined Sorin Group, a LivaNova legacy company, more than 30 years ago. For the last 20 years, he has led the Cardiopulmonary Sales Teams in Europe and Japan, as well as spent two years as Director of Global Marketing. He also managed other company franchises including Heart Valves, Cardiac Rhythm Management and Neuromodulation. Throughout his career, Poletti has developed core competencies in product development, product positioning and launch, and sales execution.

Alex Shvartsburg is the Chief Financial Officer of LivaNova.

From November 2020 to July 2021, Mr. Shvartsburg served as  the interim Chief Financial Officer of LivaNova. Prior to his appointment to the role, he led the LivaNova Corporate Financial Planning and Analysis group and was the International Region CFO. Before joining LivaNova in 2017, Mr. Shvartsburg was CFO and Chief Operating Officer of Caligor, a private equity-backed clinical services organization, where he was responsible for Finance, Operations, Human Resources and Information Technology functions. Before that, he held finance leadership roles including CFO of the Genetic Sciences division at Thermo Fisher Scientific, Senior Finance Director M&A at Life Technologies, and for over 20 years, Mr. Shvartsburg held a series of finance roles of increasing responsibility within Johnson & Johnson.

Mr. Shvartsburg earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting from Drexel University and a Master of Business Administration from LaSalle University. He is a Certified Management Accountant.

Ahmet Tezel, Ph.D., is Chief Innovation Officer of LivaNova. He joined the company in May 2024.

Tezel has a 20-year track record, guiding teams that have developed market-leading technologies across diverse medical domains from bariatric surgery to surgical ophthalmology. Prior to joining LivaNova, he served as Company Group Chairman at Johnson & Johnson MedTech, leading its Global R&D and Innovation teams. Other R&D career experience includes executive-level positions with Ethicon, Alcon, Inc., and Allergan Inc., where Tezel developed Class III implantables and complex medical capital equipment. He has an established track record of innovation turnarounds across diverse medical technology platforms. He began his career as an R&D scientist in 2004 at Inamed Corp. in Santa Barbara, Calif. 

Tezel earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in chemical engineering from Bogazici University in Türkiye and a doctorate in chemical engineering from the University of California-Santa Barbara in the field of transdermal drug delivery and vaccination.