Cris De Luca is the Global Director of Digital Innovation at Johnson & Johnson Innovation, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He is responsible for identifying and enabling transformational high-tech external innovation solutions across J&J’s Innovation Centers, JLABS incubators, and JJDC corp ventures supporting the Pharma, Consumer and Medical Device businesses.  He formerly led Emerging Technology programs within research informatics at Novartis.

De Luca is most notably known for his role in the innovation economy since Co-Founding Ultra Light Startups, the oldest and largest startup-investor pitch accelerator in Boston and New York City with additional chapters in Silicon Valley and London. ULS accelerated 700+ bootstrapping startups with 26% having gone on to raise angel/venture funding, leading to several large-scale acquisitions by companies such as Apple, Trip Advisor and Singapore Telecom.

Cris serves on the advisory boards of SXSW Health, AARP Health Innovation and VOICE Summit by Amazon Alexa. He holds a Masters in Computer Information Systems from Boston University and recognized as a 40 under 40 Healthcare Innovator by the Boston Business Journal and Medtech Boston.