Sikka 2023 Optimizer Day

Vijay Sikka is the Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Sikka Software Corporation. Under his leadership, Sikka Software has grown from a start-up to have over 35,000 practice installations and 120m patients on its platform for healthcare on the demand side and over 50 companies which have built applications on the supply side. Prior to Sikka Software, Vijay has worked in Artificial Intelligence and decision systems for more than 25 years of experience with large scale projects at Intel Corporation, National Institutes of Health, Glaxo Smith Kline, Roche and UCSF affiliates. In 1996, Vijay founded IBrain Software, Inc. that used to compete with Informatica, Hyperion and Cognos and served as its CEO until its acquisition in 1998 by Entigen Corporation, a healthcare information company that later became part of Roche. After that Vijay co-founded Bodha.com that was acquired by Peregrine Systems/Remedy that later became part of BMC Software. Vijay holds an M.S. degree in EE and AI from Syracuse University, New York, pursued doctoral studies in neurosciences at Stanford University (incomplete Ph.D), and is a Registered Continuing Education Provider in California. He is a frequent speaker at big data, AI, healthcare, technology and quality meetings. Vijay’s book on Maximizing ROI on Software Development was published by Taylor and Francis International and earns him a proud royalty check every few months.

Vijay was invited keynote speaker at the Digital Health World Conferences in 2019 and 2020, AI Global Forum 2020 and Biohacking Congress in London in 2020. He has published and presented in many artificial intelligence and neural network meetings and conferences including International Joint Conference on Neural Networks, SPIE, IEEE, AAAI and CHMT and the precursor of NeurIPS.

Nick is passionate about helping companies achieve their goals through strategic leadership, customer experience, and operational excellence. With over 17 years of experience in the dental industry, Nick has a proven track record of success in leading teams, driving growth, and improving profitability.

In his previous role as COO at Chrisad, Nick led a team of 70+ employees and oversaw all aspects of business operations. He successfully drove 13 years of financial and operational growth, mentored all sales and operations teams, and built sales processes and systems that resulted in increased revenue and stellar client engagement.

Nick is also an expert in developing and managing key customer relationships to ensure the results of our partnership are effective and impactful.

In his spare time, Nick enjoys spending time with his family, coaching and playing baseball and traveling.

Venesa Lewis has over 30 years of dental industry experience. Throughout her career, she has worked with both private and capitation practice management groups. Her various duties have given her the knowledge to understand and support dental practices by working with doctors and teams to implement innovative operational solutions that eliminate inefficiencies and improve practice bottom-line performance. Ms. Lewis has specialized in turnaround situations in which she identified practice problems and implemented corrective strategies.

Shaun Pryor is an expert in practice management, employment practices, patient management and dental business budgeting. Ms. Pryor demonstrates outstanding strategic and analytical skills, attention to detail, and intuitiveness. She has an exceptional ability to consult, train, motivate and lead dental practice owners and dental teams of complex structure and dynamics.

In 1983, Ms. Pryor launched her dental career as an RDA working in private practice until 1993. She then went into small business ownership for 8 years, which gives her a unique perspective on how to manage employees and run a profitable business. In 2008 she went back into Dental landing a multiple office manager role with Pacific Dental Services. This experience allows Ms. Pryor to have insight into how the world of Corporate Dentistry operates, which helps her private practice clients to compete against the fastest growing Dental business model competing against private practice today. Then in 2013, Ms. Pryor joined the California Dental Association (CDA). In this role, Ms. Pryor was the Practice Management and HR Analyst for the Practice Support Center. It was through this role that Ms. Pryor grasped the professional challenges faced by dentists, and was able to help increase the association’s membership by offering professional resources and guidance to dentists at all stages of their careers.

It was the needs of the CDA members that brought Ms. Pryor to the point where she became a Practice Advisor with CDA. Ms. Pryor was instrumental in developing the Program know as CDA Advising. While at the CDA, Ms. Pryor provided expert consulting, training, and executive coaching to a variety of practice groups, specializing in Orthodontic and Pediatric Dental Practice consulting services, delivering these services directly in the office.

Further, Ms. Pryor lectured to audiences of 50-500 attendees at multiple CDA conventions, specialty organization meetings, and local dental societies while at CDA.

In 2017, Ms. Pryor transitioned from Practice Advisor with the CDA to independent consultant, with the goal to provide in-depth, strategic, and focused coaching, training, and guidance to private practice dental teams. She formed her own company, Practice Management Partners (PMP) specifically to help a group of professionals that she has been working with her entire career be successful in their own Dental Business.

JoAnne Tanner has more than 30 years of experience as a dental consultant, is a dedicated professional with a wealth of expertise in the dental industry. JoAnne holds a Masters in Business Administration with an emphasis in strategic planning. She also served five years of active duty as a Dental Technician in the United States Navy.

JoAnne has become one of the nation’s leaders in the innovative development of dental practices. JoAnne has worked closely with hundreds of dentists across North America designing and implementing customized dental practice management strategies, dental marketing plans, and dental consulting programs.

By utilizing these management skills, she is able to tell the difference between a practice that runs efficiently and one that doesn’t. JoAnne Tanner can assist you in finding the right practice to meet your needs, and guide you through the acquisition process.

Owner and Chief Executive Officer of Passion Dental Services, Dr. Patrick Assioun, opened his first orthodontic practice in 2002 following completion of his orthodontic residency at the Harvard School of Dental Medicine.

While running his first practice, Dr. Patrick Assioun quickly realized that to build a successful clinic, he not only needed to provide quality clinical care to his patients but also needed to master the administrative responsibilities as well. And, as his practice grew, it soon became apparent that the ever-expanding administrative burden was preventing him from focusing on what most clinicians really loved, which was the clinical side of dentistry.

And so his vision came to life - building a dental organization where doctors could focus on what they were passionate about, specifically caring for patients, while alleviating their administrative burden and therefore improving the work-life balance.

Brian is a marketing professional passionate about helping companies drive growth through strategic marketing initiatives. With an eye for design and a penchant for analytics, Brian sits at the crossroads of creativity and data to construct essential marketing strategies and meaningful content.

As the current Marketing Lead at sikka.ai, Brian draws upon his background as a content and product marketer and his affinity for technology to drive company growth. Brian excels at working cross-functionally with product, engineering, sales, and operational teams in order to create strategies that increase growth and bring in revenue.

In his free time, Brian enjoys cooking, watching a plethora of sports, and staying active through swimming and training.

Andrew is a Product Manager with an affinity for helping companies and their customers succeed by creating engaging, effective solutions that allow users to achieve their goals. With a background in Product Design, Andrew is constantly seeking out areas of opportunity to enhance Sikka’s formidable product line and drive innovation.

Outside of work Andrew enjoys watching motorsports, growing carnivorous plants, art, and spending time with his family.