"EVERY COMPANY NOW IS A TECHNOLOGY COMPANY….."
Dr. Vas Narasimhan, is Chief Executive Officer {CEO} of Novartis which has annual revenues of more than $50bn (ÂŁ41 bn} and 125,000 employees around the world. Under his leadership, the company has completed over USD 70 billion in strategic transactions. Rakesh Rathi based in Europe is a senior IT and Business Transformation Executive. He has received multiple corporate awards including a prestigious and decorated award from President of India for "driving innovative digital business transformation with (-suite executives of large global firms''.
Excerpts from Vas and Rakesh on how innovation and technology are essential leadership traits.
What is your current focus around innovation and technology?
The focus is about 80 per cent innovative medicines and 20 per cent generics. It is a good mix of long-term and short-term. We have 15 launches coming up in innovative medicines. We got six new drug approvals last year. We have 165 projects in drug development, which will hopefully be the next wave of innovation at Novartis. Some of this technology will take longer to evolve. Some of them are near-term RNA interference, and
