Chris Julian — Founder

As a mechanical design engineer, Chris Julian has 20 years in the medical device industry.  In 2001 Chris founded Ridge Medical Designs, Inc. a medical device consulting company and in 2007 Chris founded Benchmark Devices a specialized mechanical fatigue testing and automation systems corporation.

Over the past 8 years Chris has consulted with more then 40 med-device companies and has developed tools and devices for the Medical Robotic, Cardiac, Spine, GI, ENT, Gynecological, Neuro, and Obesity spaces to name a few. Chris also has a long history designing mechanical fatigue testing and manufacturing process equipment for the med-device industry. Prior to starting Ridge Medical, Chris worked at Intuitive Surgical, Inc. where as a Senior Mechanical Engineer; he developed several instruments for Endoscopic Cardiac and General Surgery. Chris was instrumental in developing Intuitive's Endoscopic Beating Heart Stabilizer which was ultimately sold to Medtronic and is currently marketed as the “Octopus TE”. At Symphonix Devices, Inc, Chris was a member of the founding team that developed the first FDA approved, Implantable Middle Ear Hearing Device. During his second year at Symphonix, Chris was instrumental in driving the implantable transducer device to US clinical trials, and ultimately FDA approval. Chris began his medical device industry career at Ventritex, Inc. working within the R&D department; Chris helped Ventritex develop its first, second, and third-generation of Defibrillation/Pacing Leads. During Chris's 6 years at Ventritex he was wholly in charge of their mechanical fatigue testing efforts. Developing and fabricating more than a dozen different types of defibrillation/pacing lead testers, Chris was instrumental in validating one of Ventritex's core competencies; defibrillation leads. In 1996, Chris's "CENELEC" mechanical fatigue tester design was established as one of the required pacing lead fatigue tests in order to receive CE or FDA approval.

Chris is listed as an inventor on more then 25 issued patents, and an additional 15+ patents pending approval.

Matthew Messana

Matt joined Ridge Medical and Benchmark Devices in September 2007. Since that time, his involvement has led to a significant increase in the level of automation for Ridge’s projects. Matt has experience programming PLCs, touch screens and embedded microcontrollers. In addition to the programming skills, his true expertise is a strong understanding of integration of these systems with mechanical components. Matt has designed custom pneumatic systems, stepper motor systems, and circuit boards to perform the required automation tasks for Ridge Medical’s projects.
In addition to his work with Ridge Medical, Matt is concurrently a PhD Candidate at Stanford University in the Mechanical Engineering department. His PhD research focuses on the fabrication and reliability of Silicon MEMS structures. This research requires work in a clean room, circuit design knowledge and a strong understanding of material properties. Additionally at Stanford, Matt has lectured an Introduction to Mechatronics course for three quarters. This teaching experience has reinforced his knowledge of the integration of software, electronics and mechanical components. In his early years at Stanford, Matt also worked part-time at Lockheed Martin designing materials tests for carbon fiber parts and working closely with manufacturing engineers to optimize and improve the manufacturing process of a large scale aerospace project.

Wes Smith

Wes joined Ridge Medical and Benchmark Devices in September 2008. He is concurrently working on his Ph.D. Degree in mechanical engineering at Stanford University where his research focuses on characterizing failure mechanisms and boosting the reliability of micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS). More specifically, Wes is measuring the properties of adhesion, friction, and wear that occur at micro- and nano-scale contacts. Prior to his Ph.D. work, Wes received his Masters Degree in mechanical engineering at Stanford University where his studies focused on the integration of electronic sensors and actuators with embedded programming and mechanical design. In 2005, Wes participated in the fabrication and evaluation of piezoelectric thin films in novel MEMS devices as a research intern at Robert Bosch Corporation, RTC in Palo Alto, CA. Wes also had an internship at HP Labs in Palo Alto, CA where he developed a friction force test apparatus for a probe based data storage device. This work formed the foundation for his Ph.D. research.