Dev Malya Sarkar FRSA is an innovation strategist and open innovation enabler, passionate about identifying and addressing unmet health and care needs through meaningful, inclusive, and socially-integrable innovation.

Over the past decade, Dev’s work has focussed on helping global corporations, start-ups, innovation labs, and venture acceleration groups across India, the US, and the UK design and deliver user/patient-centred products, services, and ecosystem initiatives spanning diverse clinical needs. He invented India’s first preventive solution addressing cumulative stress disorders in clinicians whilst his work on business model innovation in diabetes was integrated into India’s largest home healthcare firm’s service delivery model. More recently, he served on the board of Healthcare Information & Management Systems Society, Inc. (HIMSS) USA’s India chapter, helping develop a nationwide framework to drive digital health innovation, entrepreneurship, and public policy.

Dev is currently a Cambridge Trust, RADMA-UK, and Trinity-Henry Barlow (honourary) doctoral research scholar at Cambridge University’s Institute for Manufacturing (IfM). As a member of the IfM’s Centre for Technology Management, his research — guided by Professor Tim Minshall — explores the role of open innovation (through early-stage user involvement) in helping firms better understand and address unmet user needs to enhance user-informed, needs-driven innovation in digital health apps.

Dev holds a bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering from Manipal University, India, and a master’s degree in biomechanics from the University of Manchester, UK, where he graduated summa cum laude. He was inducted into the Government of India-Department of Biotechnology’s flagship Stanford-India Biodesign program in 2014 to train in frugal innovation and is a certified bio-designer.

His research and practice interests include strategic innovation management, frugal innovation design and deployment, and open innovation frameworks in health technology and digital health. A Fellow of the RSA (the royal society for arts, manufactures and commerce), Dev was recognised by the Europe India Centre for Business and Industry (EICBI) as a EuropeIndia40 Leader for his contributions to digital health innovation. 

Dev loves engaging with budding and seasoned scientists, engineers, and innovators through various innovation advancement forums — including sectoral advisory for the United States-India Science and Technology Endowment Fund — and serving performing arts-based poverty alleviation initiatives for underprivileged children across Karnataka, India.