Founded in 2009 ilumivu has a track record of providing highly flexible and powerful web and mobile software systems to behavioral health researchers and clinical care organizations.

The ilumivu System is a robust, patient­-centered, software platform designed to capture rich, multimodal behavioral data streams through user engagement. Our mobile and web applications integrate with third-party sensors to facilitate connected health research. The ilumivu System can be customized to suit the needs of your organization or a specific project.

Our mission is to empower both users and researchers with actionable information. Ilumivu was founded by two people from very different backgrounds who came together to create Software for Humanity. Katherine Houghton has a PhD in Psychology and a background in designing intervention programs for families of children with autism. Mark Tuomenoksa is an innovative software developer and system architect with a background in communications and health research.

In 2009 Katherine and Mark began talking about the data collection and reporting needs of families struggling with autism as Katherine was searching for ways to more effectively measure outcomes and track the process of change in families. Traditional psychology methods don’t allow for frequent enough measurement to provide an understanding of the dynamics of change – throughout the day, a month or a year of development.

Ilumivu’s first project was to create an online, parent-centered platform for families of children with autism to track daily changes in symptoms, behaviors and treatments. The platform allowed parents to share information with team members (teachers, nutritionists, therapists, etc.) and create dynamic charts and reports so they could see what treatments and therapies were correlated with which symptoms and behaviors.

Once the platform got out into the market, care organizations, schools and research groups started asking for their own systems. The ilumivu System grew into a single-source piece of software that can be quickly replicated and customized to support any project.

Through collaborating with clients ilumivu saw the need for people to be able to enter data from their mobile devices. In 2011 the native apps on Apple and Android were built to seamlessly integrate with the online platforms. Through this process mEMA – the mobile EMA apps – were born. Ilumivu continues to learn from our clients and develop the ilumivu system in response the their changing needs.

Hearing from our clients about their clinical or research work to support and better help those with challenging health or educational needs is what keeps us going.

Mark Tuomenoksa
Co-founder & CTO

Mark has 30 years of experience in software, communications research and development and has been granted eleven U.S. patents for software and systems development. He has worked in environments where cutting edge and new inventions were daily attributes of work. Through this experience he has developed a skill that has proven very helpful: the ability to translate technology to people who have no understanding of it, and create software that does what people want it to do even when they find it challenging to express what they want.

Mark Tuomenoksa is one of those rare individuals who are neurologically ambidextrous, equally comfortable with both left-brained and right-brained thinking. Schooled at the acclaimed Berklee College of Music, Mark is an accomplished musician who also happens to have spent seventeen years at Bell Laboratories where he was a Principal Investigator in the research division and a protégé of Nobel Laureate, Arno Penzias. At Bell Labs, Mark worked on everything from the development of the first 32-bit microprocessor to the commercialization of the UNIX operating system to the creation and operation of advanced interactive-voice services for companies like United Airlines, JC Penny and Charles Schwab. Mark left Bell Labs in the mid-nineties to join Boston-area start-up Shiva Corporation where he was both chief technology officer and vice president of marketing. At Shiva, Mark directed product management and marketing activities for remote access, virtual private networking and software product lines. A key player in developing and implementing corporate strategy, Mark was a central component of the company’s investor-relations team (speaking regularly with Wall Street industry analysts) and a catalyst in efforts that led to a successful merger with Intel Corporation.

After the merger, Mark left Intel to found OpenReach Inc, an Internet-security company that provided virtual private networking (VPN; see the Salon article about Mark and VPNs) services that transformed sundry Internet-connections into secure corporate-networks. The OpenReach service was the first credible replacement for expensive frame-relay networks and was named Network Magazine’s Product-of-the-Year in 2003. Since OpenReach, Mark has split his time among pro bono work for organizations in human-development and autism-treatment, new and interesting technology projects, and music. Mark has personally developed embedded algorithms for implantable medical devices, web platforms for autism research, and IOS and Android applications that integrate biometric, environmental and observational monitoring.

When Mark is not busy with Ilumivu he plays saxophone, flute, keyboards, bass and guitar and has performed and recorded with bands everywhere from Boston to New York to Las Vegas. Mark and his wife Iris live in the Berkshires of Western Massachusetts, a place they both describe as heaven.

katherine houghton,
co-founder&research director

Specializing in parent-implemented approaches to autism Katherine is bridging the gap between current published research in autism treatment and the training commonly available to parents.

Since 2000 Kat has worked directly with over 900 families. Working one-on-one with children in playrooms across the US, Europe, South America and the Middle East Katherine has had extensive hands-on experience of the entire spectrum of autism. Countless hours on the floor playing with cars and trains, lining up blocks, jumping, swinging, singing, blowing bubbles, flipping book pages, inspecting the details of the tiniest objects, and giving tickles and rides have left her with a deep appreciation for and delight in children with autism. This experience forms the backbone of all her work with parents. Through a gentle, self-reflective, person-centered approach Katherine helps parents find peace with the diagnosis of their children while providing practical training in evidence-based autism treatment. Whether working with one family in their home or with large groups she enjoys helping parents re-discover the joy in their children, their own creativity in play and their confidence to take charge of their child’s development.

This experience of closely supporting families struggling with autism inspired Katherine to look beyond behavioral interventions to discover what other tools could be helpful. Her work with wearable sensors and mobile tacking lead to the development of the ilumivu system with Mark.

In 2015 Katherine completed a PhD through Lancaster University (UK) in Psychology looking specifically at parent-implemented treatments for autism. Study one investigated the effects of a relationship-based approach on the spontaneous social and communication behaviors of children with autism (published in the Journal of Communication Disorders). Studies two and three investigated the effects of a low-cost parent-training program she created for families in underserved and culturally diverse communities. The training program was run in the Bronx NY and then translated into Spanish and run in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Both trials helped parents learn how to interact with their children in a more optimal manner and facilitate change in core autism symptomology in the children.

In addition to running ilumivu and completing her PhD, Katherine currently provides parent training to families via online video review, phone consultation, in-home trainings and group workshops.

selected resume: Mark Tuomenoksa

BELL LABORATORIES (1982-1990); RESEARCH DEPARTMENT HEAD; DISTINGUISHED MEMBER OF TECHNICAL STAFF

AT&T (1991-1995); DIRECTOR, ADVANCED MEDIA SERVICES

LUCENT TECHNOLOGIES (1996-1997); BUSINESS PLANNING VICE-PRESIDENT

SHIVA CORP (1997-1999); CTO & VP MARKETING

OPENREACH INC (1999-2003); CEO & FOUNDER;

TEFSOFT INC. (2003-PRESENT); CEO & FOUNDER;

ANGEL MEDICAL SYSTEMS (2009 – 2012); SOFTWARE ENGINEER;

ILUMIVU INC. (2009 – PRESENT); CTO & CO-FOUNDER;

selected resume: Katherine Houghton

UNIVERSITY OF LONDON (UK) (1998-2000); PSYCHOLOGY TUTOR;

PRIVATE AUTISM CENTER (USA) (2000-2002); CHILD FACILITATOR;

PRIVATE AUTISM CENTER (USA) (2002-2006); TEACHER AND STAFF TRAINER;

RELATIONSHIP-BASED AUTISM CONSULTANT, PRIVATE PRACTICE (USA) (2006-PRESENT);

LANCASTER UNIVERSITY (UK) (2007-2015); PHD PSYCHOLOGY CANDIDATE;