Thibault Geoui — AI, Drug Discovery What Next Generation of Scientists Must Learn

Adam Walker:I\'m Adam Walker, a biometrics consultant, and this is the Pharma Prescribed Podcast where leaders, innovators, and hidden voices in healthcare open up, no sound bites, no spin, just raw insight, one prescription at a time. In an industry driven by data protocols and pressure, we rarely pause to ask the human questions, what drives us, what breaks us, and what truths live behind the titles we wear?

Adam Walker:Today we\'re joined by Dr. Tebo z, host of the acclaimed Tech and Drugs podcast, and a driving force at the intersection of biotech innovation and digital transformation. His podcast has become a go-to platform for unpacking the future of pharma, where Thibault brings a rare blend of scientific insight and startup savvy.

Adam Walker:Having worked across r and d venture strategy and digital health ecosystems as head of science Analytics at Charles River Laboratories, Dr. JU spearheaded the creation of a forward-thinking product and data strategy, leveraging advanced digital solutions to accelerate discovery and keep the organization at the leading edge of the life sciences sector.

Adam Walker:His current role as Director of Transformation at zuka, he leads the go-to-market strategy for the company\'s pharma lab automation offering, aligning engineering excellence with real world demands of drug and r and d. His work includes translating complex science into actionable insight and for connecting the dots between technology, regulation, and patient impact.

Adam Walker:Thibault, it\'s great to welcome you on the podcast today. How are you? Hey,

Thibault Geoui:I\'m great. Thanks for having me, Adam, and thanks for seeing you again.

Adam Walker:What can I say? You gave me a platform some time ago and I want to do the same and return the compliment to you.

Adam Walker:So for the audience that aren\'t familiar with you, what\'s the mission you\'re on and how are you going about doing that?

Thibault Geoui:I, think like many people you have on your podcast and people you know that we interact with. I\'m a, scientist by training. For as long as I can remember, I\'ve been interested in science and pretty quickly I became interested in biology. I started to be interested in, diseases and how to treat diseases.

Thibault Geoui:At some point I wanted to become a doctor. It didn\'t really work out, so I was looking for, okay, how can I still help doctors and help patient? And long story short, I\'m sure we\'ll get there. I started to work on. Enablers of the pharmaceutical industry. I started by developing tools that I use in the lab.

Thibault Geoui:Then many years ago, I switched to the digital side of things. And when I started to get in digital, I was like, okay that\'s really where I want to do my career.

Thibault Geoui:In, in the end we are in an industry that, revolves around data and data are messy.

Thibault Geoui:There are lots of great things we can do around data, creating insights accelerating things, accelerating discovery and that\'s what I want to do. And that\'s what I\'ve been doing for many years. Developing products, data, products that are used by scientists in r and d and helping organization leverage their data.

Thibault Geoui:Discover more things with data. Put that data into models, train models. Solve all the challenges that are linked to that. Yeah, that\'s a long answer to a simple question, and I\'m sure we\'ll dig deeper into that.

Thibault Geoui:But yeah, that\'s what I\'m doing. I\'m working with scientists that are very smart, that are solving very challenging question and that need all the help they can get from a bunch of people. And I\'m trying to play my part.

Adam Walker:Thank you for explaining that, and I presume you would agree with me that there\'s never been a more interesting time to be in and around data science, medical sciences, and the data that you mentioned that\'s proliferating everywhere we turn right now.

Thibault Geoui:Yeah, I think what\'s fascinating is that, I think now we can talk about the world post chat, GPT, like post when it was launched. This attracted so much interest, and of course in every industry, like everyone wanted to do things. But I think what I found fascinating in the past few years is all the investment and attention, especially from the tech sector to solving, scientific challenges in, healthcare and in pharma. I\'ve never seen so much, interest and investment in our domain. And I find it absolutely fascinating that now you have engineers who have normally worked on, social media platform or games or finance problems.

Thibault Geoui:Now they work in helping us develop better drugs. I think it\'s a much better use of their brain than what they were doing before. Might be a little bit biased but I think this is fascinating because then you have so many new ideas and so many new ways of looking at all problems where let\'s be honest.

Thibault Geoui:In our industry, we all know it takes so much time and it costs so much to develop a drug. We are failing all the time, so we need to reinvent how we are. Developing drugs. And like some people are talking about looking at drug development as an engineering discipline, or biology as an engineering discipline.

Thibault Geoui:It might be over simplistic sometime, but I like this idea of trying to completely change the lens of complex problems. I think the magic happens when you start to have people from very different background who are looking at the problem together, but with their own, view on the problem.

Thibault Geoui:That\'s really diversity. Of background, of the diversity of science, the diversity of perspective. That\'s something that will help us make real breakthrough.

Adam Walker:Yeah, I think that\'s a really. Helpful insight.

Adam Walker:Something that\'s occurred to me recently and in speaking to friends and colleagues in and around this industry, is that enormous demand for that skillset, the data science skillset that can go down into the roots of finance and gaming and various other areas.

Adam Walker:There is such a premium on. A very tight group of skills at the moment though, isn\'t there? And if I were a data scientist today, I think I\'d be writing my own checks. I think the kids that are coming out of university today, if they\'ve got their head screwed on correctly, they can be making a pretty penny pretty quickly, can\'t they?

Thibault Geoui:And I think that\'s great what you just said because, think back when I was doing my PhD and like you, I have a few friends who, went the, traditional route of becoming a scientist, working in academia and at that time, it was really because people were driven by passion.

Thibault Geoui:They knew that they would not make a lot of money. And now the thing that I find really good is that this career is not only, like a passion, but they can make a very good living out of it. And I\'m glad that now we are rewarding people who can make an impact on patient life. And again, it\'s not that I don\'t like social media or finance or whatever, but I think that finally, we are paying scientists who are impacting patient life at the right level.

Adam Walker:Yeah. Yeah. I agree. It\'s opening the door to opportunity for people that wouldn\'t otherwise be coming into our industry.

Adam Walker:That\'s a certainty. Our roots into clinical research. Though different and varied really are fairly structured down a science route, aren\'t they Like, you, I had aspirations of being a medical doctor and. Subsequently managed to just spend an awful lot of time around medical doctors and realizing that perhaps their skillset was very different to mine, thankfully, because it gave me an opportunity to be in the same room as those people.

Adam Walker:And they\'re brilliant minds. But what occurs to me more and more today is just that there are opportunities out there far broader than we could ever have anticipated in our working careers. 25, 30 years ago, it was a very different world. Technology has advanced enormously in that period of time.

Adam Walker:And I\'m just curious, you said post chat GPT world so it\'s old hat now, so it does it feel like old hat for you because I know you are really at the forefront of that and you expose yourself to many of these tools and use them on a more regular basis than probably many of our audience.

Thibault Geoui:Let\'s be clear. I don\'t use the tools as a scientist. I use them for, for productivity. And I try to stay as much up to date as possible on all the developments.

Thibault Geoui:But what, gets me really excited is that, yes, so we\'ve seen those really fast development of large language models, but it doesn\'t stop there, and you have a lot of scientists who are saying, look, large language model are great. They are really useful. Their development has been certainly the fastest in the history of tech products. But it\'s not the end of the story. And we need to think about over architecture. People talk about HGI or SGI. You have the variation, of the artificial general intelligence or artificial super intelligence for biology.

Thibault Geoui:So you are starting to see people in our industry talking about. Biology, super intelligence. And that requires, a mix of different approach. I\'m not an AI scientist. I\'m, let\'s say, an observer of a field and I\'m working with people who are driving the development of those tools.

Thibault Geoui:But what is that there is more and more. Multi models. There are, different input. I think it was y ker who is the director of research at Meta who was saying, aI will not be smart or will not be really intelligent until it can get a multisensory input.

Thibault Geoui:It\'s not enough to be able to just read things. It needs to be able to feel things, to see things, to hear things. And today I was looking at the launch of the latest Gemini model the robotics model from Google. And I think it\'s really going into this direction.

Thibault Geoui:And that\'s the thing that really gets me excited because you start to see robots. That you can talk to. That\'s the large language model part of things. But we can see things, we can touch things, we can interact with the world. And that\'s the thing that gets me really excited. This recent development of AI plus robotics and, the impact it\'ll have, for everything around us.

Thibault Geoui:But I think there are lots of really cool application coming up in the lab as well.

Adam Walker:I appreciate you sharing that insight.

Adam Walker:I\'m also curious to your thoughts around the next generation that are currently in education today, what is the message that we should be sending to those students and those young people?

Adam Walker:What are the skills they need and how do they engage with technology today that\'s gonna support them for their future careers? When I listen to various technologists talking about what the next 5, 10, 15 years may look like, it\'s a very different world. That seems and sounds a lot like science fiction.

Adam Walker:I\'m just curious to know how you would translate that to this next generation, because I have lots and lots of very interested people coming in. Through universities, through my alumni and in friends and family. And I\'d love to know what your perspective is on that.

Thibault Geoui:Again, I think it\'s a million dollar question.

Thibault Geoui:I, think there are really two aspects to look at it. In the end, I think there are basic skills that, no, matter of the development of technology, those skills will always be important and maybe even more important now. No critical thinking. Being able to think for yourself, being able to assess when you see a piece of information, to be able to assess, okay, what is it that I\'m looking at?

Thibault Geoui:Where does it come from, to be able to ask the right question. Asking the right question has always been a very important skill. I think it\'s becoming even more important today. So I think, those basic skills, that your standout education. It\'s supposed to provide, I think, if it was relevant a hundred years ago, it\'s still very relevant today.

Thibault Geoui:And like I think there is a lot of discussion around, oh, today we don\'t need to, teach things that we used to teach years ago because now people can just get the information online. And to be honest I think it\'s the wrong approach anyway.

Thibault Geoui:The curriculum. When you go to school, it\'s not about learning things by heart, it\'s about learning how to learn. It\'s about learning how to think. So of course, you can find, you don\'t have to remember everything. You will find this information. But, using or treating your brain like a muscle, I think it\'s something which is important

Thibault Geoui:now to, the other part of the, question. What should people study, how do you anticipate things you know, that will come in five or 10 years from now? Let\'s be honest, people who are working in AI now, a few of them might have, studying ai, but I think the vast majority didn\'t study ai. They studied something else and then they came to a certain job where they have to perform certain things and they are using AI or they are developing ai I think when people say, I\'m working in ai, it means so many things.

Thibault Geoui:It, not only. Being a developer of a model, you can be a product manager who will be using the capability of AI to perform certain tasks. You can be a leader or manager of an organization who will look at AI as a tool, a new tool in the toolbox. So again back to your question, what should people study?

Thibault Geoui:I think. I think they should study something that they\'re interested in. That\'s the first thing. , Let\'s look at where, our industry now, we see people who come with a scientific background, a life science background, and people who come with a technology background.

Thibault Geoui:And I think the magic happens when you can get those two Populations that are very different working together. And I think developing those skills to be at the interface between discipline will be more and more important in the future. Studying life science, but then, during your life science studies.

Thibault Geoui:Learning about technology, maybe learning to code. I know now it\'s popular to say people don\'t need to learn how to code anymore. Again, I don\'t think it\'s about learning how to code. It\'s about, understanding, training your Brain to think about something.

Thibault Geoui:Of course, now there are tools that will be better than you, faster than you, but you want to understand what you\'re doing, not just use a tool blindly. So again I will focus on something that I like and then I will try to learn something else, to be this person that is at the interface that can leverage technology for a certain purpose.

Adam Walker:I would agree with that and indeed it mirrors my own experience over the last probably 15 years where I\'ve worked alongside a lot of people using systems and platforms and implementing systems and software. But alongside that, one of those key skills that I was exposed to was software development and.

Adam Walker:Installation and validation around that. That\'s a fairly basic thing, but without knowing it, you can\'t go into an organization and potentially manage vendors, manage software providers, or even understand what\'s under the hood of the tools that we\'re using to come up with answers.

Adam Walker:It\'s learning through doing.

Adam Walker:You mentioned learning to learn, but also what I hear a lot around now is just that there is deep learning. You are an academic, your background is in academia. You spend a lot of time in deep learning. And deep learning by definition means deep in the knowledge, deep in the weeds.

Adam Walker:Looking at the minutia, but also processing it really deeply. And my sense today is unfortunately that our next generation are doing this, rather than it going deep into their deep psyche, deep learning. And my concern, if I have one particular one, it\'s that it doesn\'t go deep enough into their brains and into their learned inherent core.

Adam Walker:To really make it embedded because it\'s just surface like the tools, like the social media, it\'s just popping up and going, popping up and going. It\'s not embedding itself in writing a thesis, in doing those deep dives into a library, pulling out all the papers, the journals, the articles, connecting the dots of the challenges.

Adam Walker:That\'s my perspective. And I just would love to hear your view on that as an academic, because I do consider you an academic, I understanding your background.

Thibault Geoui:So I don\'t know if I agree with that. Yes I think obviously nowadays, we are surrounded by tools that are just.

Thibault Geoui:Taking our attention, and it\'s not just kids. I see myself, I, you\'ll start something, video on YouTube, and then you see the next one and the next one. And God forbid, you\'re doing that on your mobile. So you have the shorts and then you know, you, after, you start with something and you knew why you started with this thing, and then 30 minute later you\'re looking at something completely different.

Thibault Geoui:So I think, that people have changes, that they are in a completely different environment from the one where we grew up. And I don\'t think that we will have been different or we will have a different behavior if we had been exposed to the same, tool.

Thibault Geoui:So it\'s just that there are so many things fighting for our attention. So that\'s one thing. Now I think, I was talking about passion.

Thibault Geoui:I think where I would disagree with you is that. I think it\'s so important for people to find their passion and what they\'re passionate about.

Thibault Geoui:Because I think when you are passionate about something, that\'s what will drive focus and attention. \'cause if you\'re passionate about something, then by definition you will, filter out the noise and you will, want to learn more things about something and it doesn\'t feel like work because that\'s something that you\'re passionate about.

Thibault Geoui:I think the danger today is that there are so many things that are, again, fighting for attention that. People might have more difficulties finding the thing that they are passionate about. So that\'s the thing where I will be a bit more worried about is, if it\'s true that I meet, younger people, now I\'m talking like an old person younger people who you know you\'re wondering if there is anything that is really passionate them.

Thibault Geoui:And I think that, like most scientists, I think I was lucky enough to find something that I was deeply passionate about that. You want to spend time, learning it. And it\'s not learning for learning, it\'s just because you really first for, for knowledge about a certain topic.

Thibault Geoui:And when I was a kid, I remember when people were asking me, what is it that you want to to do when you grow up? I was saying at that time, I want to invent new things. And that turned into becoming a researcher. And for me, I didn\'t know what was being a researcher when I was a kid, but I was lucky enough to have parents that brought me to labs.

Thibault Geoui:I grew up close to Geneva, so I visited this particle accelerator many times as a kid. And the interesting thing is that my parents are absolutely not scientists. My mother is a nurse. My father, worked in real estate, but they had connection and they realized that I was interested in something.

Thibault Geoui:So they exposed me to it. And then, I started to get more and more interested and, wanted to know more. And again, I think that\'s what we can do with, the next generation is to. Expose them to different thing, and then when you start to see that they\'re interested in something, then help them explore it.

Thibault Geoui:I have a 10-year-old daughter, and that\'s what I\'m trying to do with her. But I realize the challenge, like she\'s exposed to all those things, like all the screens and all the scrolling and all that. And it\'s very challenging. I think everyone is challenged today to try to channel them to something that feels a bit more productive.

Adam Walker:Yeah. Yeah.

Adam Walker:It\'s called the distraction economy for a reason, isn\'t it? Yeah, there is definitely value in distracting people and trying to gain their attention. And something that I speak to my kids about, they\'re both university students now, but they often ask my wife and I about how on earth they\'re supposed to navigate the world of.

Adam Walker:Even relationships, talking about relationships and finding a life partner when there\'s so much distraction in the dating world. Nevermind In the educational world, it, not something that I ever had to worry about.

Thibault Geoui:glad my daughter is 10,

Adam Walker:it blows my mind, honestly. It blows my mind. And I have to share that because as I say, that distraction economy is pivotal to so many aspects of their growing adult lives, young adult lives. And I don\'t lay awake at night worrying about it because thankfully, I think they\'re gonna be okay.

Adam Walker:They\'re fairly grounded and I\'m sure your daughter is pretty grounded as well. But it isn\'t easy. It definitely isn\'t easy. It sounds like your parents also had a very good approach to giving you opportunity. Like all parents, expose your kids to as many different things and see what floats their boat.

Adam Walker:That\'s, as a parent, the best thing that you can do, isn\'t it? It is just the variation. Yeah. Why? I\'ve just spotted over your shoulder. Is that giant Lego, by the way? Ah, yes. Yes. These are giant Legos. My point exactly. You clearly are a Lego fan, but around that particular thing, it\'s exposure to broad experiences and having fun in learning is key, isn\'t it?

Adam Walker:It\'s finding the thing that lights you up, but more than once and on a regular basis, that just sends you down that, rabbit hole of interest.

Thibault Geoui:I think again, you\'re talking about fun, I\'m talking about passion. I think it\'s the same thing. It\'s learning should not be painful.

Thibault Geoui:Otherwise, you won\'t do it. I don\'t think that people do the things that are painful. They want to do things that they derive pleasure from, and I think, the school system is designed in such a way that for some people, they might derive pleasure from, the way it\'s designed and the way the knowledge is delivered to them.

Thibault Geoui:But I think for. A large part of the population, that don\'t fit into this exact mold then, the experience is painful. And, it\'s interesting because when I was doing my PhD, I remember, we, had groups of PhD students where we had training together.

Thibault Geoui:We were giving classes, so we were like kind of assistant professor. They were bringing us in retreat for a few days in the mountains around. And we had, those long discussion about our experience, like getting into science and teaching.

Thibault Geoui:And you wouldn\'t believe the number of people who told me that when they were in high school. They were told by their professor. You should not study because you\'re not good at that. And just find a job after, you graduate from high school. I heard that from my biology teacher.

Thibault Geoui:She was telling me, you should not study because you\'re not made for that.

Thibault Geoui:And it\'s interesting because like so many people who are doing their PhDs. Had this experience because we were not necessarily fitting into this exact mold during high school.

Thibault Geoui:And for me, I don\'t know if it\'s the right English expression, maybe I\'m a contrarian know if someone tells me that I should not do something, I will do it.

Thibault Geoui:And then, like I ended up doing a PhD in in biology. I think there is more than just doing it, just to, annoy my old biology professor. But I think, the fact that you are being told that you can\'t do something, even if you like it, then for some it can create two reactions.

Thibault Geoui:For some people it might break them. For other people, it might give them even more energy to prove other people wrong.

Thibault Geoui:But I think this is so important and now, being a parent that something that I\'m paying so much attention to. When teacher are saying something, sometimes they don\'t think about it.

Thibault Geoui:Then it can really impact the development of a kid. If you tell them, ah, you\'re not really good at that, focus on something else. I think it\'s terrible. I think there are so many ways of learning. You might not be good, with a certain way of learning, I think the more important thing is find the ways of learning that works for you.

Adam Walker:Yeah I absolutely agree with that.

Adam Walker:And in fact. With both of our children. Neither of them had it easy academically, particularly in the state school system in the uk and either of them could have quite easily just finished high school and left and got jobs.

Adam Walker:But what was really interesting, I think for my wife and I was really just that. We knew the value that higher education gave for us. And it wasn\'t just about the higher education, it was about the life experiences that it gave us. It was the breadth of understanding of living with people, figuring out bills, all of those kind of things that sit alongside.

Adam Walker:Going to lectures, socializing, making sure you\'re getting there, delivering and handing in your coursework on time. But I can honestly say for both, our kids, they\'re pretty, well-rounded, but also both of them are fairly late developers. They found their passion and their drive and their energy where education was concerned at a much later point.

Adam Walker:If they\'d have listened to the teachers and their educators at a younger age, they would\'ve been on the scrap heap academically and indeed. Both of them individually have done amazing things because they didn\'t take that label with them. And there were others in their peer group, and I\'m sure you\'ll experience this with your daughter as well.

Adam Walker:Others in their peer group who were clearly shining at the age of 12, 13, that then fell by the wayside because the best kid at 12 and 13 isn\'t always. The best student at 17, 18, because all sorts of other things are going on for them. Then there\'s, hormones, there\'s life, there\'s external factors that are going on around them, and I don\'t think anyone really appreciates quite how impactful that could be.

Adam Walker:I know we\'re going down a very different route to what I anticipated speaking about today, but nevertheless, I think this is a really, key point that, is worth sharing.

Thibault Geoui:Yeah. No, definitely.

Adam Walker:So coming back to you Thibault and your experiences, you inspired me to set up a podcast.

Adam Walker:You had me on your tech and drugs podcast some time ago, and I really loved your, what I call your main character energy. You have unbelievable energy and you have drive and determination. And even before we hit record today, you were telling me about all the things that you were doing. I\'d love to know, what drove you to set up a podcast of your own?

Adam Walker:Why did you think there was value in you doing that? What was your passion around that?

Thibault Geoui:So first of all, I like listening to podcasts. So that\'s the first thing. When I go running, by definition, I will listen to a podcast because that\'s when I have time to do it.

Thibault Geoui:And there again, like we were talking about learning earlier now. If I think back to when I was, I don\'t know, 20 for instance, we didn\'t have access to all this knowledge. Now just pick a topic and you will have thousands of things and there is always something new to, discover.

Thibault Geoui:So yes, first thing, love podcast.

Thibault Geoui:The second thing is that , one of the things that drove me to starting this podcast, is that. I love technology and I love, drug discovery and development. And for me, there was a gap. I could find sometime a few episodes of different podcasts talking about the application of technology to the development of drugs.

Thibault Geoui:But there was not one podcast that really told only about that, where we brought guests that were, using AI ml, so automation. To accelerate drug discovery and development. So I was like, Hey, I want to talk about that because that\'s what I want to listen to.

Thibault Geoui:And the, third thing, which is, very selfishly I wanted to meet people and I thought, look, it\'s easier to meet people and to connect to people if you have something to offer. So if you have a platform to offer and now the podcast is still small.

Thibault Geoui:There are just a few episodes, generally speaking, people who participated, they liked it. And I think , it can be useful for them because then they, can tell the story and then there, is a place where their story is recorded and they can share it.

Thibault Geoui:So for me it was really almost like a tool to connect with new people. And that\'s how we met. And we ended up then meeting, face-to-face. So that\'s really what I like actually now, I\'ve never been a natural networker. Actually, I didn\'t like networking because I don\'t like to start a conversation with someone that I don\'t know if I don\'t know what they\'re interested in.

Thibault Geoui:My friends make fun of me when I tell them that I\'m quite shy. They\'re like, no, you\'re not shy. You like to talk and you like to do podcasts and things like that. I\'m like, yes. I like to do that. If I can control the topic that we are talking about, I don\'t like to talk about random stuff.

Thibault Geoui:Let\'s talk about AI and drug development and then, if you want to talk about that, I\'ll have a conversation with you for three hours. That\'s why, when I started this podcast I\'m like, Hey, it\'s a control environment again. Science, control environment where I know what we will be talking about.

Thibault Geoui:I know that it\'s something that will be interesting to me and to the people I\'m inviting because we accepted, we invite to talk about technology and drug guarantee. So that\'s a story.

Adam Walker:Yeah.

Adam Walker:I mean that, really does resonate so loudly with me because, similar to you, when I\'m walking my dogs and I\'ve got three of them, I\'m looking around me.

Adam Walker:They\'re not here at the moment \'cause they make too much noise. But when I\'m walking my dogs, that\'s what I\'m doing. And exactly to that point around knowledge. I love hearing other people\'s stories and also you feel like. On your shoulder. It feels like quite an intimate thing, doesn\'t it? It feels like you\'re having a one-to-one with that person particularly.

Adam Walker:And as someone who co-hosted a podcast previously, I loved it and I also recognized that it did generate interest, both in the services that I offer as an independent consultant, but more importantly, it made connections with people that I wouldn\'t otherwise have met. When that started, that was during the pandemic when we were all locked down.

Adam Walker:And the world actually was much more accessible because you only had to send someone an invitation and you could have a conversation with a CEO that would never have spoken to you in a conference setting, and you\'ve got them for a, lotted period of time. And you can ask \'em as many questions as you want, like you said, on your terms.

Adam Walker:And it\'s proved to be quite a powerful tool and I think. It\'s really key to forming deeper connections across this industry in which we work. It\'s just that sometimes you just don\'t know what you\'re gonna unearth in these conversations. As I say, we\'re fortunate enough to have met and I\'ve sensed your energy in person as much as I sensed it before we met, actually virtually, because I think for you it really does resonate.

Adam Walker:Through a screen, dare I say So I appreciate you sharing that. And there is no, limit to what you can do on a podcast. Is there, there\'s fun to be had in the editing, in the cutting, in, all the things that we do or don\'t do, the things that make its way to the final cut or whatever.

Adam Walker:But as far as, your plans for the Tech and Drugs podcast what are your anticipated, what are you hoping for that.

Thibault Geoui:So you mentioned, like editing and advocating. That\'s the part I don\'t like. What I like is talking to people, like this first time you meet someone and you have this discussion, you hear all the interesting things they have to say.

Thibault Geoui:For me listening again to that afterward, like multiple times and, doing the cutting and the editing. That\'s the thing actually, which is preventing me from doing more of it. Now.

Thibault Geoui:The good news is that I\'m working for a company called Zuka. It\'s a Swiss engineering company and where.

Thibault Geoui:We do project across multiple industry, but we are very strong in MedTech in healthcare, and we are really investing in pharma, which is why I joined them very recently in June. And, one, other thing when I joined them they were like, look. We like what you\'re doing on LinkedIn.

Thibault Geoui:We like that you\'re doing this podcast. And now they are helping me actually with editing. So they say, it\'s studio podcast but since it\'s aligned, with a topic that we want to talk about, the topic that we want to talk to our client about we can help you get more episodes out.

Thibault Geoui:And the thing that I really like is that, you\'ve been on my podcast. It\'s not a sales pitch, it\'s really about talking to people telling their story. I invited a lot of people coming from startups, so at some point of course I want to hear about the startup.

Thibault Geoui:I want to hear about why they started is what\'s the problem that they are solving. So in a way, like there is, a commercial aspect because people will know about their startup, but we are not pushing product or services. That being said the way I\'m thinking about that and I\'ve done marketing many years ago now using LinkedIn and doing this podcast, I\'m thinking about marketing in a very different way, I think.

Thibault Geoui:You don\'t have to do a sales pitch all the time, if you talk about relevant challenges, relevant topics you bring people who have expertise for me. That\'s the best sales pitch to be honest, because people will know that you are connected to the right people, that you are knowledgeable about certain topics.

Thibault Geoui:So you don\'t have to, to do a hard sell in in something like that. I think it\'s much more subtle. And in the end, you know it, you will make the right connection. You will develop your network, and that will create opportunities. I think, it\'s important to play the long game when you are, doing that.

Thibault Geoui:So yes, to answer your question, my plan for the podcast, continue doing it. Continue to meet very interesting people, to meet people that I wouldn\'t have met otherwise. And again, getting help on the part that I don\'t like doing, so that I can focus more on the thing that I like doing.

Adam Walker:Yeah, I think that\'s a brilliant perspective. You give there. I wouldn\'t say it\'s a sales pitch at all. It\'s about connecting with like-minded souls, isn\'t it? That\'s what I always feel whenever I\'m in the virtual room with someone. I feel like it\'s just us and it can go out to whoever and whomever wants to listen to it.

Adam Walker:But the reality is, I think the magic is in the virtual room. The energy is in the virtual room and the communication. There are no distractions. I love that. I switched off my phone, I\'ve turned off my emails, you\'ve got my full undivided attention. Not many people get that for very long. So I think we\'ve both committed to that.

Adam Walker:And for that, I\'m entirely appreciative of that.

Adam Walker:So you talked about Zuka. They\'re very interesting company, aren\'t they? They\'re in a lot of different verticals. And what are they a consulting company? How do they operate?

Thibault Geoui:So Zuki, it\'s a company that was born in Switzerland in 1968.

Thibault Geoui:And the DNA of Zuki at the core, it\'s a bunch of engineers. They started in the late sixties helping medical device companies, so really providing support for hardware. And throughout the years they started to add all the engineering disciplines you can imagine, hardware, electronics, optics, software, data, et cetera, et cetera.

Thibault Geoui:And then, as it\'s a consulting company as well, so they, have also the strategy and all the thing that like it\'s a full service company. And so what really attracted me to the company is that. I worked with consulting companies, over the years and sometime, like you, so you work most of the time they are really smart people, but they, will give you recommendation and then it\'s up to you to implement the recommendation.

Thibault Geoui:What I like with Zuki is that we will work with the client to understand their challenges. We will work with them to develop, an ideal solution. Then we can go to our workshops and we can design prototypes, we can iterate and we can go really fast. And then come up with with something that they can actually implement in the labs.

Thibault Geoui:And then we will stay with them. And, we have often engineers that, will stay with clients for years, that are really part of the project. So I really like this aspect of our work where it\'s really very tangible what we can deliver, and, another thing I think you know the company really, they pride themselves.

Thibault Geoui:It\'s a Swiss company, so there is a bit of a Swiss cliche that it\'s high quality. They like to take really hard engineering problem and like the harder the problem the better. So now think about that. Apply to pharma. That\'s just brilliant.

Thibault Geoui:And the other thing is that we have, colleagues that have worked across so many different industries, and as I was saying, earlier in the discussion, I think the magic happens when you get people from different backgrounds who look at your problem and say, Hey, I\'ve done that, on a different problem, a different industry.

Thibault Geoui:But have you thought about that? This is where also there is a challenge because in, pharma, people have a tendency to say, Hey, we are different, we are unique. I want people who worked exactly on the same thing, somewhere else. And I\'m like, yes, there is a value, in bringing pharma specific experience.

Thibault Geoui:But I think there is. Also a lot of value bringing experience from other domains. So I think now what we are doing is that we are hiring a lot of people with, 20 years of pharma experience. We are mixing them with people who come from very different background. And that\'s where the magic happens, when you can take all this experience across multiple domains to look at the most challenging, like strategy and engineering problems in pharma.

Thibault Geoui:What I\'m focusing on specifically is the research part. Things that people will call Lab of the future. Where you look at existing labs, where lots of instruments, for instance are not connected, where the data is in multiple silos. And now people start to see those lab in the loop where, you start your research in cco, you generate data in, semi-autonomous lab, you feed the data back into the models and they\'re like.

Thibault Geoui:I want to implement that, but then there are so many challenges associated with that because we have an existing infrastructure. They need to modernize it, but they need to modernize it while still running it. \'cause, it\'s not like we can pause for six months and change everything. Or not everyone has the chance to start from the blank slate and, have an empty lab and built it from scratch.

Thibault Geoui:If it can do that, then it\'s simple. But most of them can\'t, they have their infrastructure and they need to deal with that. So the image that I like, it\'s like flying a very old plane and trying to turn it into a fighter jet. While not crashing it. So that\'s what we help our clients, it\'s modernizing their infrastructure, picking the right use case to start with.

Thibault Geoui:Making sure that they are not stuck in endless POC, and really seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. That\'s what we want to do. That\'s how we will experiment. And that the path from experiment to production. So that\'s, what we do. That\'s what I like. I\'m happy to be, part of this journey.

Thibault Geoui:I think for me, consulting is something relatively new. And what I really like is the diversity of the project. Every day you\'re talking to a different client. We have different challenges. There are common themes of course, but, everyone is unique and everyone has a unique environment and unique problems to solve.

Adam Walker:That\'s a wonderful insight you provided there and I think it\'s almost full circle from where we started at the beginning of this conversation, talking about opportunity and bringing together experts from different fields. You\'ve coalesced that all around the example of Zuka, which sounds like a wonderful organization with amazing opportunities, not just for you, for many of our listeners, I\'m sure there is an alignment around the services that are offered.

Adam Walker:And what everyone needs. Your example of, changing an airplane mid-flight is exactly the experiences that, I\'m seeing right now as well in organizations that I\'m supporting. Technology is moving at such a pace and yet. Many of the old ways remain with us and we have to modernize in flight, as you say.

Adam Walker:Yeah. I think that\'s a really good way to, to bring us to a conclusion of the conversation.

Adam Walker:But also I always like to finish with a quick fire round. So at this point I like to ask a few brief questions around your own personal experiences, sThibault. So what is the one piece of advice that you would give to your younger self?

Thibault Geoui:Stay curious. Don\'t have preconceive ideas. Try different things. Do what you think is scary sometimes.

Adam Walker:What are the top three qualities you value most when building a team?

Thibault Geoui:Honesty. Um, Openness. Being smart.

Adam Walker:What is your favorite thing outside of work?

Thibault Geoui:I have many favorite things. Anything sci-fi related books, movies, series yeah always related to science, like your different view on science.

Adam Walker:And just in case she\'s listening, your daughter, of course.

Thibault Geoui:Of course.

Thibault Geoui:Intro. Introducing my daughter to sci-fi is one of my mission.

Adam Walker:That\'s brilliant. And finally, what is your number one golden rule in life and in business? Debo,

Thibault Geoui:it\'s an important one and it\'s a difficult one. The number one golden rule, never burned bridges. It\'s a small world. We are in such a small world, whether it\'s in life or in business, you\'ll always meet people multiple times. And I think actually maybe I have two, golden rules.

Thibault Geoui:How do you say that in English? I think it\'s called Giving Forward. I think it\'s important to give without expecting something in return. The way I\'m thinking about it is that, if you do good things, at some point, something good will happen to you.

Thibault Geoui:Maybe it\'s a bit naive, but that\'s how I like to treat people, I\'ll often, connect people together because I think it\'s the right thing to do. I don\'t expect anything in return. But then, like sometimes things come in return and then, , when you list, expect it some new opportunities comes from, people that, you met many years ago.

Thibault Geoui:You\'ve done something good for them many years ago. Yeah.

Adam Walker:I couldn\'t agree with that particular statement more, , it\'s probably the reason why you and I connected. It\'s also definitely the reason why we\'re talking today, and I think that paying forward principle is really important because effectively what you\'re saying is what you put out there is what ultimately will come back to you, whether or not there is , a paycheck or something else there.

Adam Walker:It\'s serendipity, isn\'t it? It\'s paying forward in serendipity.

Adam Walker:So we\'ve had a really broad open and interesting conversation today, Thibault. I really have enjoyed every moment of it and i\'m very much looking forward to the next opportunity when we can talk together Thibault, and explore this further because.

Adam Walker:This is really reinforcing the value of connection to me. Meeting with people, meeting with like-minded soul, but also I think paying forward, in the opportunity to just connect, reconnect, do good things together. Thank you so much today. For our listeners, if they want to reach out to you directly, what\'s the best way to get in contact with you?

Adam Walker:Thibault.

Thibault Geoui:LinkedIn, they connect, send me a DM on LinkedIn and then, I\'m there every day. Certainly too much on LinkedIn. But that\'s definitely a place where, I\'m easy to find.

Adam Walker:We\'ll make sure that gets added to the show notes. And once again, I\'d really like to thank you for taking the time to be on Pharma Prescribe today, Thibault.

Adam Walker:It\'s been an absolute delight to speak again.

Thibault Geoui:Thanks Adam. And, , next time let\'s do it in person.