BEHIND THE STRATEGY
Ignite Market Access is led by founding principals Greg Firestone and Lisa Ponssa, who collectively bring more than 50 years of experience helping healthcare companies navigate barriers that can slow or prevent market share growth.
Their work combines practical market knowledge, executive relationships, and timing discipline; the know-how, know-who, and know-when required to achieve meaningful market access.
Principal, Ignite Market Access
Greg Firestone is a C-suite leader, corporate officer, and board member with 30+ years of experience expanding market access for healthcare technologies through strategy, partnerships, market creation, consulting, and stakeholder engagement. His board service spans healthcare start-ups and global enterprises, advising on revenue growth, GTM strategy, product development, market expansion, operations, acquisitions, IPO readiness, and fundraising.
Greg began in sales and marketing leadership at Richard-Allan Medical, a medical device and laboratory diagnostics manufacturer serving hospital operating rooms and labs. He then joined Networking Consulting and Information (NCI), where he became CEO, and led operations, P&L, strategy, and market development, which eventually led to Greg acquiring NCI.
Post acquisition, Greg developed and defined “Integrated Delivery Networks (IDNs),” a term still used by healthcare supply chain stakeholders. He also established the IDN Summit & Reverse Expo, co-founded Networks of Networks for health system supply chain executives, and authored “Swimming with the Supertankers,” a guide for suppliers building contractual relationships with health systems and IDNs.
After selling NCI in 2007, he joined MedSpeed, a private equity-backed healthcare courier where he secured various multi-year IDN and health system contracts before leaving to join Resource Optimization & Innovation (ROi), a global top 10 healthcare supply chain company and GPO owned by Mercy Health, as Chief Client Officer, leading commercial strategy, business development, and sales operations.
In 2017, Greg joined TELA Bio (NASDAQ: TELA), a medical device company focused on soft tissue reconstruction, as Chief Commercial Officer and Chief Business Officer. He led market share growth, strategic initiatives, revenue growth, and commercial strategy for hospitals, health systems, IDNs, and GPO contracts, and served on the leadership team overseeing TELA Bio’s ~$50M IPO in 2019. Revenues grew from $7M to $85M before Greg’s departure in June 2026.
Principal, Ignite Market Access
Lisa Ponssa is a healthcare commercial leader with extensive experience driving growth, market access, reimbursement strategy, contracting, and executive-level partnerships across the healthcare continuum. She has collaborated with IDNs, GPOs, health systems, surgeons, and supply chain leaders to accelerate adoption of innovative medical technologies.
She previously led a team of thirty sales professionals and transformed one of the company’s lowest-performing regions into its top-performing region, earning President’s Club recognition in 2025. As Director of Strategic Accounts, she negotiated major GPO agreements that helped fuel more than 433% of company growth over five years and built strategic partnerships with leading health systems, academic medical centers, and government healthcare organizations. Lisa is known for her consultative leadership style, strategic mindset, and ability to deliver measurable results and is enthusiastic about improving patient access to innovative healthcare solutions while creating long-term value for healthcare organizations.
