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Look, we've got to talk about the impact of generative AI in real life across industries, Biofarmer being one of them, and I'm priessed to welcome with the show Paul Hudson, CEO of Sanofi, discuss how your enormous French her Farmer company has been leveraging the new technology in its operations. And yes, there's drug discovery, but also what's so interesting, Paul, is you're integrating it within the functionality of your business on a day to day basis.
Yeah, thank you, and it's a pleasure to be here. We're really trying.
To do incredible things for patients and discovering new medicines and you know, with AI being the great disruptor and all of the excitement last year, the wow of large anguige models, and this year for us, it's all about the how and how we can get our you know, the large amounts of our organization focused whether you're in a lab doing expert AI, whether using generative AI in regulatory or text driven of our business and importantly snackable
AI when we're looking at really trying to give better decision intelligence for almost everybody in the organization with the sole intent of becoming much more efficient effective in delivering new meds.
And it's amazing.
Really, I love this snackable AI you're using play it's a proprietary app. But I've got to ask sort of, how have you thought about which underlying large language model you should look to. How you integrate this do you go to outsourced do you build it from within.
Pol Well, we're drug discoverers and developers, we're not coders at our heart. So we have this first of its kind relationship now with open AI, partnership with Formation bio translating that for is to make sure that we can be customizing large language models to look at drug discovery, to try and drug undruggable diseases. To this point, and we're doing things that have really never been done before.
It's early days, but it's extremely promising. And remember there's such a large amount of diseases that don't have medsons available for them because we simply have not had the computing pairer of the opportunity to deploy ourselves. And now just now we're at this next great revolution in science. It's such a privilege actually to lead a company at this point. As for play, our sort of snackable approach, we partnered with a small startup out of Germany, a Ley.
They've been working withthers, They've grown weathers and that's, by the way, open for everybody.
We don't own it, were having to share it.
We want all boats to rise win healthcare after all, and so the more users, the more fun, the more accuracy, the more chance to discovering new medicines.
So have your talent reacted because there's so much do mongering that AI is going to take all our jobs.
Well, I think our approach has been how to weaponize our people to do better.
Like you know, I don't know whether you're familiar with.
Ways, the driving app, but I see it very much like that. I got to get in the car. I'm going to start the engine and drive to the end of the street. And if Ways says I'm statistically more likely to have an easier journey turning left rather than turning right, I want that advice as crowdsource large data, real time. I want our people to feel they are amplified or multiplied in that event.
In that event too, The goal is not about less people.
The goal is about putting our people to be more effective and to make and to have better decision intelligence that in itself gives us a great opportunity to do something incredible. And we've only seen huge Appetite's why on any given day we have eighteen thousand people in our organization using the EI we make available and I think that's pretty fantastic.
Let's talk about doing the amazing the incredible, because we have just seen a push up in your share price on the day and you've been reorientating this business of Sonofye and thinking about more R and D, about drug discovery and applicate and look some costly cases in the way that you have to experiment do clinical trials, but they've paid off today and we think about the drug discovery when it comes to a key lung chronic lung disorder.
Can you just tell us about what that means to the business.
Well, in Europe, just yesterday today we got approval for chronic constructive coon me disease. COPD picks a huge number of people third biggest killer. We're ready to go now in Europe to be able to provide an advanced therapy that will reduce their chance to go to hospital by a third, and that's a breakthrough.
And there's been so little innovation.
We aspire to be the world's leading immnology company, and that's partly driven by moments like that that we live for in our industry to do things that transform or protect patients lives, will prevent disease.
You know.
The reality is we're a very proud, huge, big company, but we wanted to be at the forefront of science again and we've made some big bets, but appropriately so to try and make sure our science is some of the most exciting and it's first in class or best in class. And to couple it with our conversation of earlier, the more we add AI, the more we improve our decision intelligence, the more opportunity we have to do more
in that space. And I think that's what's catching the excitement in our organization, and we believe we're quite far ahead. I mean, of course, we're very responsible about how we use AI, but others are still hesitating.
We're taking our moment, but sometimes you need.
Good data to feed in to these large language models. Paul, what about the data on viruses such as well bird flu At the moment here in the UK and the US. Indeed, Look, there is a worry that the data hasn't been good enough in the United States. Is that something that worries you and you need to be developing a new vaccine for that.
Look, I mean we've been through one pandemic. I think we've learned a great deal about trying to have the best data, and I think we position ourselves to take advantage of those opportunities on behalf of society. Frankly, we played a part small part in COVID, but we stand ready should we be asked the data and it's legitimacy,
you know. We often that data comes in through government channels, through health systems, you know, and we work at real time speed to make sure that we have the very best data available in terms of large language models and the rest of the data sets.
You know, we collaborate far and wide.
We have punishes with oak in with ADOM, wise with excyensia. We really are trying to make sure that we have at our fingertips huge data sets.
To mean, our accuracy.
And our predictive capability is far ahead of the competition. We won't get it right everywhere, but the data integrity of the absolute fundamental start in place. Our relationship with open AI and with Formation by It, we're putting our own data at play to make sure that they can learn from it too.
Again, all boats your rights. We're in healthcare to do good.
You're also selling off bits of healthcare because you're focusing in on the R and D, the drug side, and maybe the consumer business goes for a hefty price tag. You've been thinking about IPO and you've been thinking about sale. How is that process going poor?
Well, we announced that October that we were going to become a pure play by a Farmer. You know, we want to double down on the things we just talked about, and we have an incredibly successful and energize consumer business. We feel that they feel in fact that they can stand better on their own two feet and be independent, raise their own capital, take on their own projects, and we want to support them in that it's the right
thing to do. Our capital should be allocated towards discovering new medicines, and there should be about growing their business fast in the market, which by the way, they're doing very successfully. We've declared that buy as early as Q four twenty four will be ready to go to separate that business. We haven't shared how we will do it, but I think it's quite.
Well known that.
You know, we're talking to interesting parties, certainly Pe, and we have the capital markets vehicles available to us too, So no, we're excited for them. There's a huge amount of interest. It's a great business and we hope to create value for patients, for stakeholders, and indeed for the people in the business.
Q four twenty four is pretty notable given that we're in quite a politically uncertain time. Look, we two brips sit here looking that there's going to be an election and people voting in the UK tomorrow and then of course this weekend is all important for France. How as a leader of such a French giant, are you feeling about the political risk of doing a deal in this market?
Well, look, you know, in terms of healthcare and being a leader of an incredibly important French company, you know, our first priority is to ensure that whoever governs, they provide a predictable, stable environment. Because research is a ten to fifteen year process, so you know, we need to think long term. We hope that whoever leads the country will think long term. We know the current government has
been incredibly supportive of innovation and creating that ecosystem. We hope that that would continue.
Of course.
You know, there are people trying to understand what it means for the economy, much like for the change in government if it's to come about in the UK, and people want that predictability in the markets too. You know, we're long term player, trying to do the right things for patients, trying to drug the undruggable, and we hope to partner with whoever's in power, of course, because we have to be ready to do our part for society and and you know, so far we believe that can continue.
Paul, it's been great talking to you the intersection of drug discovery of artificial intelligence slackable AI as you call it. Paul Hudson, great to have some time. CEO of Sanofie say well,