MARY DE SOUSA
Founder and Chief Customer Officer
I have worked as a Marketer in the Medical Device Industry for over 25 years. I started as an Associate Product Manager and worked my way up to Marketing Manager, Director of Marketing, VP of Marketing, VP of Sales and Marketing and VP/GM running global business units for start-up, mid-size and large medical device companies. I often found that our excellent marketing teams were under-resourced and stretched. In other cases, we would have an opportunity to explore a new strategic product or market segment, but we did not have the people or the budget to get it done. So we left a lot of opportunities to grow our business and better serve our customers on the table. I wished I could find an agency that could supplement my team when I needed it. And I didn't need advisors... I needed doers. So I founded Contrast Marketing Solutions to provide experienced product management, marketing and strategy resources help to Medical Device Companies Accelerate, Expand and Evolve.
Take a look at my full bio below.
BACKGROUND
Mary de Sousa is a Sr. Executive with over 25 years experience successfully growing businesses and leading teams in the Medical Device Industry. She is the Founder and Chief Customer Officer for Contrast Marketing Solutions, LLC. She also serves as Director at Large for the Healthcare Business Women's Association (HBA) on the Northern New Jersey Chapter.
Prior to founding Contrast Marketing Solutions, Mary served as Vice President Sales and Marketing for Ansell Healthcare's $200M Americas Region leading a sales and marketing team of over 70 team mates. She was recruited to Ansell in 2012 to establish and grow Ansell's Healthcare Safety Solutions Business organically and through acquisition. She served as Vice President and General Manager for CareFusion's Nicolet Neurology Business, a $100M global capital equipment, software, consumable and service business with 200 team members worldwide from 2009 to 2012. From 2005 to 2009 she served as Vice President, Marketing for Cardinal Health's $100M Interventional Specialties Business where she helped double this profitable division in less than three years through organic product development, commercial infrastructure and acquisition.
Mary's earlier career started as an Associate Product Manager for CR Bard's Vascular Access Division. During her tenure, she was promoted three times ultimately to Sr. Product Manager responsible for the company's profitable Dialysis business. She left CR Bard in 2000 to join Spectranetics, then a small start-up business, to lead the successful commercialization of the Excimer Laser to treat peripheral vascular disease.
Mary holds an MBA in International Business from The Thunderbird School of International Management and a BA in Comparative Government and Chinese Studies from Oberlin College.
Mary has a wide range of clinical, market and product experience:
Product Experience: Implantable devices, physician preferred disposable devices and technologies, drug/device combination products, commodity hospital supplies and consumables, capital equipment, service (field service, parts depot, technical service and customer service) and software.
Market Experience: Acute Hospital, Integrated Delivery Networks (IDN), Group Purchasing Organizations (GPO), Outpatient Surgery and Clinics, Physician Office, Home Care, Dental, Veterinary, EMS, Medical Distribution.
Clinical/Specialty Experience: General Surgery, Vascular Surgery, Cardio-Thoracic Surgery, Oncological Surgery, Interventional Radiology, Interventional Cardiology, Neurology, Pulmonology, Nephrology, Oncology, Infusion Therapy, Infection Prevention, Wound Care.