Charles Remsberg left his post as CEO of Hocoma U.S.A for a similar position with a California-based bionic technologies company.
Remsberg will become CEO of Tibion Corp. of Moffett Field, Calif. The company has developed a bionic leg device that helps rehabilitate patients with neuromuscular impairment from stroke or chronic disease. The device, which looks similar to a knee brace, is in limited sales and clinical trials in the U.S., but Tibion is looking to scale up global marketing next year.
Remsberg shouldn’t have a problem with the transition from Hocoma to guiding Tibion’s sales efforts. Hocoma’s signature product, the Lokomat, is a robotic rehabilitation system for spinal cord injury and brain trauma rehabilitation.
In an interview with MassDevice in July, Remsberg described the Lokomat as “a robotic exo-skeleton that is strapped to a patient with a spinal cord injury, brain injury, or a stroke victim. The robotic legs assist them in walking on a treadmill.”
Remsberg told us he was the first salesman Hocoma hired and he worked his way up to running worldwide sales for the Swiss firm, before being promoted to CEO of its U.S. operations in Rockland, Mass., in 2006.
He waxed bullish on the future of robotic rehabilitation devices in the interview.
“What I tell people is that in physical medicine, robotics is the ideal medium. Robotics will play a large role in rehabilitation and physical medicine,” he said. “The future is still quite dynamic and it will attract competitors, which is good because you don’t have a market without competition and we hope that we’re a leader in that field.”
Hocoma said it will appoint a general manager from Switzerland to replace Remsberg.
In a prepared statement, Remsberg said he joined Tibion “because I am impressed with the impact its technology can have on the rehabilitation of millions of handicapped patients worldwide. I look forward to the opportunity to accelerate acceptance of the Bionic Leg, and the application of its technology to other unmet patient needs.”