In this fast-paced world, businesses form and crumble every day. The key to sustain in this competition is if the torch is bared by a skillful leader. A leader who is keen to question and learn every day, and has open ears to listen to the suggestions voiced by experts. Being inspiring to empower the team by letting them take control of their responsibilities and also appreciating the team’s effort—regardless of whether they fail or succeed. Incorporating similar aspects of an adept leader, Akhil Tripathi has been widely recognized throughout the industry.

Akhil Tripathi is the Co-founder and CEO of Signifier Medical Technologies (Signifier) and a successful serial entrepreneur and innovator in the MedTech sector. In his astonishing journey, he has been able to develop and commercialize several novel medical devices—including a robotic navigation system for neurosurgeries and a spinal implant for the cervical spine. After recognizing the underlying problems of sleep apnea, he was motivated to help the suffering patients. Alongside his Co-founder Prof. Dr. Anshul Sama, who is also a recognized member of the Signifier’s Medical Advisory Board, he laid the foundation of the company in 2015. With more than two decades of experience in sleep-disordered breathing, Dr. Anshul is a leading expert in this field. He also authored internationally recognized publications in the field of snoring and sleep disorders and is a core member of Nottingham Sleep Center.

Signifier was established with a mission to become the global leader in providing easy-to-use, accessible, clinically proven, data-driven, and cloud-based solutions for diagnosing, treating, and managing sleep-disordered breathing. To achieve this, the team of Signifier focuses on providing the patients with world-class, white glove, red carpet experience, and make sure that they receive the best therapy out there. By far, Signifier patients have completed more than 15,000 therapies in the past 12 months.

While Signifier is on an expedition to innovate the sleep medicine field, we engaged in a conversation with Akhil Tripathi to understand how his entrepreneurial voyage took place and what is the secret behind his immense success.

To begin with, could you walk us through the reason behind selecting the sleep innovation industry and establishing Signifier?

We were deeply empathetic with sleep apnea and snoring patients who were struggling with lifelong conventional treatment options. These treatments had failed to change in the last decades. I and Prof. Sama’s shared the ambition of improving the sleep and health of millions of patients worldwide propelled their idea into existence.

How will you describe the experience after receiving the feedback on your first project?

It was surely encouraging. We were aware from the beginning that our focus will be on the patient experience and tailor our device to their needs. In our first clinical trial of eXciteOSA, we were still figuring out what therapy regime worked best for our patients. So, when years later, a patient from this trial reached out to us saying how she has been using the device all this time and found her own therapy regime to meet her specific needs, it was a great triumph to see how much of a difference the device had made for her. Listening to her feedback was incredibly encouraging, and we have been more motivated to deliver the best to our clients.

It surely must have been an amazing feeling. So, after delivering the best on your first project how did you surpass that bar?

As mentioned earlier, we were determined to find the best solutions for the patients. In this past year, Signifier has focused deeply on putting mild obstructive sleep apnea at the forefront of what we do. If you closely inspect, several mild OSA patients are undiagnosed, assuming they are simply snorers. Even if they consult a sleeps specialist, the problem is ignored and managed with lifestyle choices or uncomfortable nighttime wearables. We wanted to help our patients from the beginning to gain information on their issue and connect them with a physician to provide expertise in setting them up with our clinically proven solution. This solution would be convenient and comfortable to use during the day as well.

Personal growth aids professional growth. Agreed or disagreed?

Absolutely agreed, since it is extremely difficult to grow professionally without being able to adapt one’s mindset. If you aren’t willing to grow through challenges in both your personal and professional life, you will struggle immensely in convincing others that your vision is worth following.

If you were to revisit your day 1 at your company and do one thing differently, what would it be?

I would establish the core values on day one. The process of creating core values understandably takes time as the organization develops on many fronts, but sketching out the company DNA at the outset makes decision-making easier and every difficult choice can be held up to those values.

For you, what can be termed as the best form of investment?

I believe the best form of investment is the investment made in the right people at the right time. It is always wise to invest in people who possess courage, capacity, humility, integrity, accountability, and discipline to take the company to the next level.

Apart from the team, what factors have been the reason behind standing out amidst your competitors?

We have always adopted a mindset ingrained in continuous learning and commitment to innovation, which has helped us stand out amongst the competitors. Since the beginning, we wanted to develop a daytime solution that treats the root cause of the problem for our patients. As our business continued to grow robustly, we remained focused on the patient experience, technical infrastructure, and data-driven strategy to differentiate ourselves.

According to you, what are some traits that any beginner should inculcate to become an influential leader?

In my opinion, there are several factors that one should adopt to become an influential leader, but a few of the essential traits could be being passionate and genuinely enthusiastic about your goals. Likewise, be confident and ambitious to lead tasks and people, but be ready to have honest conversations on how to improve things with experts among your team. Most importantly, be self-aware of your strengths and weakness and seek to learn every day.

Being a veteran in the industry, could you reflect on why most people struggle with getting their voice heard as an entrepreneur, specifically in the medical industry?

I think people are often committed to the idea that improving current options is better than creating something completely different. For instance, take the sleep space. PAP therapy has been established for so many decades now as the key solution to sleep disordered breathing. You often see major companies focusing on how to make their device more comfortable to use and less intrusive rather than thinking from the perspective of doing something else entirely. And that’s when it becomes difficult to make your voice heard as an entrepreneur; when you’re told that a solution that works already exists, so it should be optimized rather than replaced—evolution rather than revolution, so to speak. Signifier is of the opinion that good shouldn’t get in the way of great and aims to innovate by keeping the patient experience at the center of all we do.

As a serial entrepreneur, how will you elaborate on the importance of sleep—for entrepreneurs specifically?

Sleep is at the core of everything we do; without a good night’s sleep, it’s extremely difficult to focus during the day and deliver your best performance, form deeper connections with people, and make the most of your time. So for entrepreneurs especially, a good night’s rest is essential, particularly if one’s daytime hours are hyper-focused on delivering results and opportunities to rest are scarce.

As our conversation comes to an end, please enlighten us about the plans mapped out for 2021?

We’ve got many things planned that we’d love to do as quickly as possible to expand our pipeline, but the most exciting opportunity for us would be to test the results of our technology on moderate OSA.

Quote:“My leadership style evolved over the years by shifting the focus from setting goals to creating a vision and from building systems to building relationships.”