Welcome to Picocyl

Singularly focused to envision and bring to market new products and solutions which solve today’s and tomorrow’s challenges.

About

Picocyl is a forward-looking organization which is singularly focused to envision and bring to market new products and solutions which solve today’s and tomorrow’s medical and specialized high-quality application delivery system challenges. Through a full lifecycle of experiential design and engineering services, unique rapid product development approach, state-of-the-art cleanroom manufacturing facilities (ISO Class 8), and commitment to unsurpassed quality, performance and efficacy, Picocyl has earned a reputation as one of the medical industry’s premier innovators and thought leaders for delivery systems.

A pioneer in developing unique energy sources for drug delivery, the Company’s flagship Pico-Cylinders have become the industry standard for single use, pressurized gas cylinders. Designed and built from the ground up for the strict requirements of medical, quality compliance, Pico-cylinders are leak free, with superior performance, energy and power density, and low noise impact. Produced in cleanroom manufacturing facilities in the United States of America, Pico-cylinders come in multiple standard form factors. Pico-cylinders can also be completely customized for unique size, weight, fill requirements, pressures, puncture forces and gas types.

Picocyl is ISO 13485:2016 certified, has been audited and approved by numerous medical device and pharmaceutical firms, and has been FDA Inspected.

Our Value Proposition

Picocyl enables the future of drug delivery and other special applications through innovative device design and gas-powered solutions for the medical and pharmaceutical markets. Every product, application and solution we deliver is built from the ground up in our USA-based, state-of-the-art, cleanroom manufacturing facilities (ISO Class 8).

Our extensive methodologies are holistically aligned for medical-grade quality, performance, reliability, efficacy, compliance and for optimal manufacturability. It is our Team of original thinkers, thought leaders and master engineers who lead Picocyl and our organizational core competency to envision and bring to market new, modern applications and solutions which solve today’s and tomorrow’s drug delivery challenges.

Our Team

Bob Barron

CEO

Bio

Bob is the CEO and CO-founder of Picocyl.  Mr. Barron is a proven business leader with a strong Operating background, along with experience in transactions and investments.  He has led businesses from start-ups to Fortune 1000 firms, and was a Venture Partner at a leading venture capital firm.  He has served on various Boards, numerous Advisory Boards, and guided entrepreneurs to the successful launching of their companies.

As CEO of Chromatis Networks, Bob was responsible for a $4.5B M&A transaction that led to him being featured on CNBC for leading the largest Small Cap transaction in U.S. history. Bob also lead a highly successful commercial spin-out of a government contract manufacturing business, MQA, facilitating a 500% market capitalization increase. 

Throughout his career, Bob’s focus and success was based on building and motivating teams to develop strategies for growth, and to execute successfully through proven business processes.  Mr. Barron began P&L responsibility in 1986 as Group Vice President of Stanford Telecom, a public technology company.  Today, Bob enjoys flying his Bonanza, backcountry skiing, getting off-the-grid in Alaska, and being married to his wife.

Jack Auld

CTO

Bio

Jack is a Co-Founder of Picocyl and well-established in the medical device industry. Jack’s passion is leading smart people to creatively solve real-world problems with innovative solutions that yield effective, high-demand products and processes. Prior to founding Picocyl, Jack worked extensively with retina surgeons to deeply understand their objectives, identify their needs and translate those needs into current market-leading, state-of-the art, handheld surgical instruments. His fifteen successful years in motorsports and specialty vehicle design/development with the Toyota off road racing team and MillenWorks taught Jack to flourish at solving challenging problems in fast-paced, team-centric environments. He currently holds 51 US and 100 International patents.

Jack graduated from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo with a BS in Mechanical Engineering. He is happily married with two great twenty-something children, active in the outdoors with a passion for hiking, lightweight backpacking and riding motorcycles.

Patrick Lee

CFO

Bio

Patrick is the CFO since the inception of PICOCYL. Patrick is also the founder and principal of KLP Tax & Financial Group, Inc. and has over 32 years of experience in providing professional accounting, tax and financial planning services. Patrick is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), Personal Financial Specialist (PFS) and Certified Financial Planner (CFP) serving startup companies, closely held businesses, and high net worth clients. Patrick was a tax manager with Ernst & Young specializing in tax planning services, mergers and acquisitions, tax examinations and appeals, due diligence, transaction structuring, financial accounting for income taxes, buyer and seller side representation, and international tax planning.

Patrick earned his undergraduate finance degree from University of Wisconsin, Madison and his Master in Accounting Science degree with concentrations in Taxation and Information Systems from University of Illinois, Urbana/Champaign.

Patrick is committed to actively contributing to the community and various non-profit organizations. He was the Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer for 2-1-1 Orange County and a board member at the Orange County Heritage Museum. His favorite ways to enjoy life are to spending time with family and friends, traveling to different places, reading or listening to good books, and dining out.

Anura Welikala

Sr. VP of Plastic Injection Molding

Bio

Mr. Welikala has a lifelong love of plastics that has only grown with his decades of experience focusing on injection molding for medical devices. Starting with the founding of Apec in 1997, he built the company from the ground up to focus exclusively on injection molding of medical parts and successfully grew the business until it was acquired by Helix Medical in 2007, where he continued to serve for another 6 years as the Executive Vice President Global Business Development. In 2014 he cofounded Medacys, an injection molding company based in Shenzhen, China that flourished and eventually merged with EG Gilero.

Foundational to his life is his family. In his free time he enjoys cultivating new types of plants in his garden and his relentless curiosity has inspired him to pursue education in bee biology and Beekeeping to better understand the fascinatingly complex insects that help his garden thrive.

Tom Costello

Director of Business Development

Bio

Tom has 30 years of product / business development, marketing and sales experience in medical devices and pharma with experience in start-up and large corporations. Prior to joining PICOCYL, Tom led the global strategic business development activities for Scott Medical Products, a CDMO with expertise in gas-based drugs, APIs and medical devices, where he established the company’s first DMF in China. In sales and marketing roles with a start-up company, now part Philips Medical Systems, he was instrumental in the promotion and proliferation of the first automatic external defibrillator (AED) designed for use by lay people to improve the 2-3% survival rate of Sudden Cardiac Arrest (SCA) victims via early defibrillation.

Tom earned his B.A. in Biology from Lafayette College and M.B.A. from Villanova University. Tom enjoys activities with his loving wife and 4 kids as well as riding motorcycles, working out, exploring the outdoors and boating.

Kirsten Lynggard

Finance & Administration

Bio

With over 17-years in medical manufacturing, Kirsten has successfully executed site objectives while growing partnerships with customers and suppliers. Her unique combination of production planning, supply chain optimization, operational management, and finance skills allows her to support Picocyl’s strategic business plans, grow internal and external relationships while providing insight to day to day manufacturing operations.

Although dedicated to her professional development, she enjoy camping, river rafting, fly fishing and snowboarding with family and friends.

James Lescoulie

Medical Gas Specialist

Bio

James has been developing leading edge medical device technology with a focus in the ophthalmic industry since 2003. Working closely with gas synthesis manufacturers and analytical laboratories, James has cultivated robust partnerships to source the highest quality gas available. He also led the design and development efforts for the initial valve-release Pico-cylinders, putting in place the processes for ensuring implantable medical grade gas purity and product reliability.

James graduated from the University of Southern California with a BS and MS in Biomedical Engineering.

Yule Kim

Engineering Manager

Bio

Yule has over 8-years of engineering experience in medical device industry, and has developed knowledge and skillsets in both R&D and manufacturing world.  This allows Yule to make contributions to Picocyl in many different ways including development of new applications, and improving and maintaining manufacturing efficiency and quality. All of Yule’s professional career has been with start-up companies, so he enjoys and fits well to a fast-paced medical-device manufacturing environment. 

In his free time, Yule enjoys being outdoor for traveling, hiking and snowboarding.

Pete Bliss

Principal Applications Engineer

Bio

Mr. Bliss has over 35 years of experience in medical device and industrial gas equipment design and manufacturing. He holds numerous patents and is an author of studies published in peer reviewed medical journals as well as abstracts and conference presentations. He is currently a principal in the consulting firm Techniflow Inc. Peter received a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Minnesota. He has been with the industrial gas equipment firm Minnesota Valley Engineering (now Chart Industries), Chief Engineer of the custom valve manufacturer Wair Products Inc, and partner in the consulting firm Valley Inspired Products. Peter was co-founder and Chief Technology Officer of the start-up device firm, Oxytec Medical which introduced an innovative and industry leading portable oxygen concentrator for respiratory patients. After acquisition of Oxytec he stayed on as Principal Engineer with Philips Healthcare for 7 years.

Peter lives with his wife Joan and three children near Minneapolis, MN.

Peter Lao

Engineering Technician

Bio

Peter has 10 years of medical manufacturing experience. He has worked in a wide variety of environments and acquired valuable trade skills. Peter has implemented these skills at Picocyl and contributed to current production processes and on-going engineering builds.

In his free time, he enjoys running, being outdoors, cooking, watching sports and spending time with his family and friends.

Matt McCawley

Senior Applications Engineer

Bio

Matt has sixteen years of experience as a Mechanical Engineer, six of which have been spent designing Pico-cylinders for medical devices. He currently holds nine patents, two related to the development of Pico-cylinders. He is a graduate of Cal Poly Pomona with a BS in Mechanical Engineering. Matt and his wife Jenna have four daughters- Kara, Allison, Sadie and Nomathemba.

In his free time Matt enjoys mountain biking, reading, and spending time with his wife.

Eric Anderfaas

Scientist, PhD Mechanical Engineering

Bio

Dr. Eric began his engineering career in start-up companies developing computer peripherals, optics, optical coatings and vehicle systems.  Now with over 25 years’ experience, his forte is developing multi-domain systems such as medical fluidic systems or computer controlled vehicle suspensions.  Eric brings real world understanding in addition to advanced analysis skills of dynamic system modeling using Bond Graphs, computer simulations, and finite element analysis to a wide range of difficult problems.

Eric graduated from Cal Poly, S.L.O. magna cum laude with a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering and from U.C. Davis with a M.S. and Ph.D. in M.E. Dynamic Systems and Controls.  Eric currently has 15 US patents.  Happily married with a twenty something son and twin girls working towards their college degrees.  Eric also enjoys developing and testing new technologies applied to interesting systems, such as bicycles, motorcycles and cars.

Cesar Leyva

Program Manager

Bio

Cesar Leyva has been working in the medical device industry for over 12 years and specializes in process development, new product introduction and technology transfers for class 3 implantable devices. Cesar has led cross-geographical teams in the technology transfer projects and has supported successful regulatory approvals across the globe. Cesar supports Picocyl in the manufacturing front and ensures that the processes are developed and implemented following all necessary quality and regulatory requirements. Cesar graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Electronics Engineering and holds an MBA, he is also certified as a lean/six sigma black belt.

He dedicates his free time to his family of 3 boys and a beautiful wife!

John Dunne

Special Applications Engineer

Bio

John is a Mechanical Engineer with over 30 years of experience creating and innovating for many markets including medical, automotive including EVs, aviation, entertainment, theme parks, recreation, racing, and defense. He has spent the last three years helping to develop devices and solutions for the medical industry. He studied Mechanical Engineering at Cal Poly Pomona. His favorite activities are mountain and road riding, hiking, and swimming.

Nick Welche

Senior Project Engineer

Bio

Nick’s has been contributing to Picocyl’s success since its inception. He helped create the process development, implementation and validation of the automated and manual processes. In addition to this, he implemented ancillary processes required for maintaining the quality of the gas cylinders. Nick assisted with establishing Picocyl by participating in the transfer, implementation and training of equipment and processes. Nick currently supports Picocyl with the design of components and fixtures that enable the use of Pico-cylinders in new devices.

Kassandra Smith

Operations Manager

Bio

Kassandra has over 6 years of manufacturing operational experience in various industries ranging from precision optics, commercial and home building products, to propulsion solutions and automotive safety. She brings to Picocyl diverse manufacturing knowledge in areas of process engineering, product design, continuous improvement with lean ideology, automation systems, and quality systems.

Kassandra is an Indiana State University Mechanical Engineering graduate. In her free time, she enjoys creating, renovating, building, and spending time outdoors.

Kellan Roth

Mechanical Engineer

Bio

Kellan is starting his career with Picocyl after graduating from Colorado State University with his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering in 2022. During his master’s degree, Kellan developed design and R&D skills in the biomedical field while working on his thesis in the cardiovascular biomechanics lab.

In his free time, Kellan enjoys traveling, hiking, and is an avid Denver sports fan. 

Seung Yoon

Quality Manager

Bio

Seung has over 15 years of quality experience with various medical and combination devices.

He started his career in manufacturing, where he was introduced to quality and has worked with various Class I, II, and III products.

Seung provides a vast experience with new product development, manufacturing, and quality management systems.

Seung earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and has obtained various certifications from the American Society of Quality.

In his free time, he enjoys the outdoors, automobiles, and spending time with family and friends.

Emma Hansen

Manufacturing Engineer

Bio

Emma has several years of manufacturing experience, having worked and interned with several different medical device companies. She brings a unique set of skills to Picocyl, having participated in an accelerated one-year Biomedical Engineering Master’s program with an entrepreneurial focus at the University of Wisconsin. She also obtained her undergraduate degree in biomedical engineering at Wisconsin.

Having skied since the age of 3, Emma knew she wanted to move to Colorado following the completion of her Master’s degree. She is also passionate about 3D printing, hiking 14ers, and training for half marathons.

Innovation in everything we do.

Driving innovation with our leak-free cylinder designs and sub-systems through thought leadership, a commitment to experiential design and rapid development, and state-of-the-art cleanroom manufacturing facilities.

Innovation
On-Demand

Rapid
Development

Cleanroom
Manufacturing

Comprehensive
Services