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- [00:01]
Host
At the heart of an industrial revolution is an innovation that changes everything. Building AI. Boston sees artificial intelligence as a renaissance. From the heart of innovation and the Mecca of tech learning. We bring you AI for real people, A conversation for everyone. Our guest today is Jen Azar. She's a visionary leader in life sciences, energy and industrial manufacturing. As the CEO of Stellix, Jen is at the helm of a company whose mission is to unite people, science and technology and deliver transformative solutions for a more sustainable future. Under her leadership, Stelix has earned a place on the INKS 5000 list of America's Fastest Growing Private Companies for three consecutive years. Today we talk about Jen's passion for the future and her vision to leverage the power of digital new Science and Industry 5.0 to ultimately change lives for the better. Welcome to the show, Jen. Thanks.
- [01:04]
Jen Azar
Thanks for having me.
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Host
Oh, I'm thrilled. Walk us through a little bit of your journey, if you will. I mean, even the past three years, you've seen technology accelerate and you've adapted, like probably not very many people I've ever heard. And, and I just kind of want to talk about your success if you would just walk us through a little bit of that journey.
- [01:24]
Jen Azar
Yeah, sure. So I've been blessed to, to grow up in Boston in kind of like two distinct pillars in my mind. One is technology, so electrical engineer, love technology. I'm a geek and I really focused in that area around automating and digitizing life science, manufacturing. So that brings me to the second pillar, which is the industry that I'm very passionate about, life science. As I saw the changes happening in science and the new types of products that were going to be available to humans, I said, hey, we're going to be sitting at this revolution that sits between science and technology. And bringing them together, I think is like one of these fusions, right? We talk about AI all the time. Like it's a technology, but it also can be a strategy. It can shift pretty significantly an industry. And you either come with it and evolve your approach to the industry, or you hold on to yesterday and you're going to get destroyed. Right? And there's numerous examples of that that you can see. So I just said, hey, we're going to ride into it. We can sequence the genome now, so we're going to stop treating disease and we're going to start treating the body. We need to be doing both. And so how do we really get our business ready for the next 20 years to create the same type of environment? I grew up here. We're an ESOP or employee owned. I was given a lot of opportunity to grow and develop and create value. And so I really want that for the next generation of Stellixers.
- [03:03]
Host
So lucky girl, very lucky. And what I think I've seen you do is value within that, within all of that, you really value the people that you work with. And I've heard you say that people evolve with technology differently. So you're number one, you're pat, but I think number two, you're willing to inject a lot of humor into that because not every, everybody. I've heard it said that things evolve at the speed of safety. You've created a very safe culture to make human errors happen and also gotten into the weeds just literally with whiteboards and a team going, hey, let's solve these things piece at a time. Because these are really complex things you're solving. And that's, that's what I've seen of your work.
- [03:44]
Jen Azar
Yes. So I'm not perfect. So I would say I'm patient but impatient. So we've done a lot of growing, right. So we have this transformative time at this intersection of digital and science, but we're also scaled with the growth and that brings some human challenges. For sure, we haven't done it perfect, but I would say, culturally we're surrounded by people that want to learn and want to make a difference in the world for people. So that I think that those culture tenets definitely help. For some of the days that are a little bit harder, you take a step back and say, okay, this one moment in time where I'm living today is really painful. But if you think on a longer term impact, I think it makes every painful day a little bit easier. That's, that's a gen ism. And I just, I really believe AI is going to make us have better quality of life. I, I know you can think of a thousand different ways it could be scary, but I think in general, if we lean in with good leadership, people are going to use this technology to make human lives better. It's going to make us work in a different way. And, and that can be invigorating and scary depending on where you are and who you are. And we all change differently. So I tend to be an early adopter. I run into things and try to say, what could the world be if we did it this way or that way? And I have to work really hard to have empathy for people that change slower. And so if I put that empathy first, it helps my patients and I'VE
- [05:30]
Host
also heard you use the word tribe a lot. You and Cara are literally elbow to elbow in a tribe unique Boston. You just came off this very exciting week. Any. It was Boston AI week, I should say, at the time of this taping. Any. Any feedback from either one of you, like, how.
- [05:45]
Jen Azar
How.
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Host
How does it feel to be in that ecosystem?
- [05:48]
Cara
Oh, amazing. And it's people like Jen that make it amazing. Let's be honest, because there are. I mean, everyone thinks of Boston as having, like, or the Boston area of having, you know, the best and brightest. And that's true. But we also just have, like, amazing people and, like, really fun people and really cool people and just great. A great, great, great group of women. Women and tech women and AI it is. It just fills my cup. And so we were joking in the pre call about, like, oh, are you going to this last event today? Are you going to that last event today? And, you know, even though I'm like, pooped out from all the running around, like, I literally want to go because it makes. It fills my battery up. You know, being around these people, it's just. It's great. And the good news is you don't. It's great to be here. So you can do that, but you can also participate, you know, virtually from wherever you are. But also you can come visit us. We're not exclusive. You don't have to literally be in Boston, from Boston to participate. So I just love it.
- [06:45]
Jen Azar
Yeah. And I think it's such a safe environment. Everyone is trying to learn, and we're all struggling with the same things. The world's coming at us faster and faster, and so we all suffer from the same human. Humanness, I guess, is how I would say it. And I feel really lucky to have been able to participate in the week. I learned a ton of. It also made me realize that there's a network of people struggling with the same things we're all struggling with. And so sometimes when you feel like you're part of something, it's easier to get up every day on the hard stuff.
- [07:29]
Host
And you talk a lot about your team and, like, who you lean into. I mean, another thing I'm impressed with, Jen, is that you're constantly learning. I think that's probably the biggest thing I've seen accelerate and chime in if you agree or if you have a perspective on this, that the. The problem isn't, you know, that there aren't people that we can connect to. The problem is that there's so much new information that AI Is Presenting us with so much and how do you get a handle on that? What do you, what sources do you go to or what's your strategy for learning and keeping up with all of it?
- [08:02]
Jen Azar
Yeah, so I've always been a non traditional learner, right. So you have schooling. But then I have this curiosity around different things. I was really lucky in my early career. I got to go to Innovators DNA. It was a book and then a class and I got to go to Google on the west coast. And it started with this concept of association. What you see in one industry, how do you apply it somewhere else or you see a piece of technology, how might that apply to your business? And that associative thinking around innovation is a place I find myself a lot of days. I guess a little bit of a dreamer, just wondering what the future is going to bring, how are we going to get there, how is that going to impact the long term value of my organization and the legacy I want to leave behind? So for me that kind of learning I get all jazzed up about. So I've always been reading, like I said, early adopter, what's coming, how's it coming? What I will tell you is that over the last two years it's been really hard for me to consume it the same way I used to and I can't outwork myself. Like it's not about, it's just not, it's not possible, right? I've tried the crazy, right? An audible in at all times. Like it just. You can't consume as fast as you can. So that actually helped me start to think about AI and how to adopt it. Because the one thing AI can do for me is it makes me faster, which creates time. For me it's not about being efficient, it's about more time to do more things that you like, you love to do. So I said how am I going to learn to use AI AI to create space, selfishly to do the things I love to do, right? So I leaned into that. Instead of someone putting it on me, I just said I can't do it this way anymore and I need more space for the things I love. Outside of the demands of what you have on a day to day biz to run a business, the curiosity in me, the, the person that wants to learn more, that wants to consume more. I just, I couldn't, I couldn't keep up with what I could read. So that really drove, that was my, that was what drove my change management into how do I use AI and how do I start with what tools I have and to become more efficient only for the goal of creating more space to learn.
- [10:42]
Cara
Right. And that's a theme that comes up on this show a lot, is this kind of idea that AI, looking at it in a certain perspective gives us more space to be human, whatever that may mean to us. And that could mean more, more time with family, that could mean doing higher level work in your profession, you know, if you're a doctor or whatever, that you spend more time with patients rather than charting everything. Or it could just be, you know, space for yourself to do things that you like, go to the gym, whatever. And that's, that's a really positive part of this revolution. It gives us, it gives us more freedom, I guess, in a lot of ways.
- [11:17]
Jen Azar
Yeah, absolutely.
- [11:18]
Host
And I would say the interesting thing about looking at your trajectory, John, because you're talking about certain things that have been around for 75 years. When I look at revolutions in the past, industrial revolutions, I see a lot of fear, I see a lot of messiness, I see a lot of people. And it's not unlike now where there's
- [11:34]
Cara
a lot of fear.
- [11:35]
Host
But what I think is so interesting about your association and the way that you think is even when you're pulling apart disparate companies, like, I know you're head of neci and that was, you know, kind of an important component, you took all those other companies that you're over and you looked at each one individually. It's almost like your approach is like a life science problem solving journey. And you're the brain and central processing unit. And you're looking at these individual components, like cells in a body with very different, you know, components. It's like your humanness is guiding this transformational journey. That's not something AI can do. So if I can step back and tell you, I think your superpower is in what you just explained. And why aren't more people thinking like this? Like I, I see companies failing because they have culture clashes, old and young, and they bring in this AI expert and suddenly the people that have been there forever are ra, but you've bypassed that somehow. And I think it's that associative thinking.
- [12:36]
Jen Azar
Yeah, I think associative thinking and then realizing that the way businesses have run to date is not how they're going to be run in the future. Right. And for a lot of times, if you think about that last third industrial revolution, it was for a long period of time. So you put a generation in that and that one, one or Two main generations worked for a long time the same way. So the pace of change is significantly different now with the way AI is transforming everything. And so what used to be steady state run a business, you just can't do that anymore and not put the potential of being disrupted. If you live in the technology services space with, combined with anything, you just can't, you cannot do that. And so I was lucky to always have been allowed to have time to dabble and innovate our services business. So I think it became just part of how I operated a business. I think there's other places where people don't have leadership that create that space to allow the innovation and then it comes down on them like thou shall, instead of giving them the space to innovate and learn and incubate to come to come on the journey. Now I will tell you, when we were just neci the first change that we made, everyone understood. But as we've scaled those businesses and we brought in people to the newer businesses, they don't really understand the old business. And the old business isn't static either. It's on a journey just at a different pace. So that was one thing that I said, okay, so in any one moment of time you can have this associative thinking and a business strategy, but you really need a way to evolve that transformation over multiple years because everyone's getting on the train at a different stop and they all of a sudden you lose your moment in time. Right? And remember I had 20, 17 years in that moment of time where it was very the same. And then the last seven or so have been dramatically different. Right. So my reference is so different than newer employees and more than half of our company is less than three years. Right. So every once in a while I'll say, okay, I have to have a different perspective. But it's hard because it's where you came from. So you have to just, you have to just create the space to and communication to really just keep connecting, which Covid was in the middle of all this. So that change too was another thing for us to adopt to. But I think if you think about AI like a strategy, it's supposed to evolve the way we work and sometimes we have to redesign the way we work. Right. So we were all remote. We flipped remote pretty well and did some amazing work during the time we had to be remote. For me to demand everyone to come back in after that wasn't the right thing to do because it also created some personal freedoms that I think we all love. So why are you going to take those away? Right. I feel like if people are good and they're human, then they're better at work. So. So we put a hybrid guideline in which was. Didn't go perfect. It said, you know, if you are within 50 miles of any one of our eight offices, we would love to see you three days a week. And we've been running that way for a while. And what I found is we've lost our connectedness. Not in. Not in the groups that work together, but across the companies. And so we've been saying, how do we further redesign? Redesign. You still want hybrid, but you got to continuously improve as you learn. It's a journey. Right. And so maybe now two days are this. Everyone's in on the same two days, and then flexibility everywhere else so that we drive connectedness. And then on those days, what do we create to make it a positive experience when everyone is together? And so looking at redesigning the human ways of working, and I guess my point to this is it's not a moment in time. You just never stop. It's, it's. It's not a sprint, it's a marathon.
- [17:18]
Cara
Yeah, yeah. And, you know, when you think about areas where AI has the most potential or this kind of change in thinking and the positive side of AI, where we know there's things that people are scared about, but you can't really think of a more perfect example than drug discovery. Right. Because everybody cares about someone with a disease or it's themselves. And, you know, the better and faster we can get to solutions for people who are sick, the better. So you just mentioned there's been this, you know, very big change in your company in the past, you know, seven or so years. So tell us about how that's impacting sort of the work that you do and the actual science that you do and what you're seeing that excites you.
- [18:02]
Jen Azar
Yeah, sure, absolutely. So what I see is there have been two big modalities up until the early 2000s that really were all we had to treat disease. They were either small molecule medications that are pharmaceutical, or they were a biologic that we kind of call life science. And so those, those two have been the primary driver for us humans to heal our, our, our woes. And what happened when we could start to sequence the genome, it allowed us to start to really look at how we could start to repair cells and DNA and RNA at a different level in our body. And if you can repair those things and then we don't get to disease. And so that totally fascinates me. In 2014, I had the opportunity to go in to the Cambridge Innovation Center. So that would have been about 10 years into my tenure at NECI, where I did a lot with the biologics portion of life science. And I went in and I was like, whoa, this looks so different. And I said, we don't really have anything to help this science. It's not like what we do. But I was curious about it and I wanted to understand why and what was happening. So at that point in time, the Cambridge Innovation center was like one building. And it was full of this, what I called emerging life science. And it was a lot of mRNA, crispr cell and gene therapy, all new modalities that would be tailored towards treating the body instead of disease. And potentially even in combination, there can be some combination drugs, combination modalities that can do some wonderful things too. So I said, oh, well, we really got to try to figure this out. And we started at that point in time working with Moderna. And it was before it was a household name. And they had this concept that they were going to digitize biology and they were going to build a platform that would allow drug discovery to happen faster and to make more. More things available. And what I loved about it is they talked like cancer was cured.
- [20:34]
Cara
Wow.
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Jen Azar
Right. And so it was eerie to me. You'd walk the halls there and to hear that. And then.
- [20:42]
Cara
You don't mean like in their mind, they already knew how they wanted to. That they had an idea of how to cure it? Is that what you mean?
- [20:50]
Jen Azar
Yes. And they. And they fundamentally believed it was curable. They still do. And so we started to talk to them about how they wanted to digitize and they wanted to work with different equipment and it looked totally different. What would normally be 80,000 square foot manufacturing suite now fit on a desktop table. Like so the scale was hugely different. And so. And data had a flow at a much faster pace and be contextualized between human workflows and automated machines. Because for things to go from manufacturing to the patient, there was a set window of time and the way the products would have to be released, the supply chain needed to be much faster at a much smaller scale. So moving towards personalized medicine. So they were going to build a first facility and it was actually being built for a personalized cancer vaccine, and it was a Nord mass. So long story short, they did a massive pivot when the COVID virus hit. And so we played an instrumental role in helping them pivot and make that vaccination and then help them scale it with a contract manufacturer in Portsmouth, New Hampshire and Switzerland. Anyhow, long story short is the curiosity around this emerging life science. That's one example. There's hundreds of thousands of that type of science available that we can't figure out how to industrialize or commercialize in a way that we can help humans. And I think it's a model, I think healthcare is at an inflection point where we're going to hit a revolution and things are really going to change. And the COVID vaccine is proof that it's doable. We can modify viruses in our DNA if we need to. Is slowed down by a, it's really a big change on how you commercialize, how you industrialize that, how you take it from inception and get it ready for patient and then how insurance and healthcare is going to work around that. Yeah, because you, you remember that there is a massive amount of money that goes into research and development in all these different categories to study whether it's cancer, whether it's cardiology, any of those disciplines, they, they spend tremendous amount of money in research and development. And the AI tools are allowing that cost to reduce because time's reduced. And then you start comparing you, you start adding AI and, and into different, all different aspects of drug discovery. You have all new equipment now to help you discover molecules. So now there's more molecules. How do you catch up the rest of the process? The, to scale it, to get it to patients? So just I, what I, what I see is a broader ecosystem coming together to make a bigger difference in people's lives. And you know, you'll never see that in a leap, but you'll see it over time, chipping away at it.
- [24:24]
Cara
Yeah.
- [24:26]
Host
Well, I commend you for mirroring that. I mean, it's one thing to talk the talk, it's another thing to walk the walk. And you've, you've shown that. And how do people stay connected to you, Jen? Like what, what can they, what can they be a part of? I, I, I'm convinced that this is the way the world should work, that everyone should think of the world as an ecosystem and company sharing information. What's the best way to stay involved in what you're doing?
- [24:47]
Jen Azar
Yep. So you can reach out to me on LinkedIn. I recently started a sub stack. In April, we're going to be having our second annual Aspire event, which will be the full event.
- [25:00]
Cara
I was there. It's a good, it's a good one. Come if you can. If, if, if you can get to Jen and get an invite, it's definitely worth it.
- [25:07]
Jen Azar
I'm always interested in collaborating. I'm about people, and I believe bringing the right people together, you can do great things.
- [25:14]
Host
So honored. So obviously, we'll put that in our show notes. It's been a pleasure to speak with you today, Jen. You are a busy woman, and yet you make me have hope in the future. You really are a visionary and a vision caster for young and old, and I, I commend you for your work. Thank you, friend, for being here with us today.
- [25:33]
Jen Azar
Thanks for having me.
- [25:35]
Host
Thank you for joining us on Building AI Boston. Stay tuned for more enlightening episodes that put you at the forefront of the conversations shaping our future.