Building the Future of IoT: Kirsten Newquist’s Vision for Identiv

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Welcome to the Mr. Beacon podcast. This week, we're interviewing Kirsten Newquist, who's the CEO of Identive. She has been doing this job for just over a year. So they've had a... Change in strategy, which is really interesting. This is a company that designs and manufactures IoT tags for RFID and Bluetooth. And I came across them at Williart.

and really liked the creativity of their engineering and their design capability. That's something that's key when you're figuring out how to scale new technologies. If you're designing IoT solutions, then this is one of the companies that you really need to get to know. And I think you'll enjoy this conversation with Kirsten. As I'm having another run at doing the CEO thing, I'm very conscious of the approach that others in the market take to this challenging job.

And I really admire Kirsten's blend of market knowledge, business savvy, and the values-based approach, which I think all of those aspects come out in our discussion. But before we get started with the interview, there have been some changes here at the Mr. Beacon podcast. Our website has moved. new place to go to for the definitive web archive of over 200 episodes of the podcast is now at podcast.ambi.ai. It used to be all over the place, partly on willyot.com, partly mrbeacon.com.

And so now there's one place to go, which is hopefully simpler and will make it easier to find. And we're going to be posting transcripts of the podcast there if you want to really get into the detail. The other thing is that we have a new sponsor, Bleacon. Now, this name won't be foreign to you if you're really into what's happening in the Bluetooth beacon ecosystem. Simon Ford is the CEO of Bleacon, and he was actually on the podcast.

back in September of last year. And it was a really popular episode. I think we had over 6,000 views just on the YouTube site alone. Part of it is he's a really interesting person, brain the size of a planet, fun to talk to, and his company is interesting. They're making technology to enable Bluetooth. for the Internet of Things, and they provide a simple, scalable way to connect lots of Bluetooth low-energy devices to the cloud securely and reliably.

So I really appreciate him and his marketing team stepping up and helping us to pay all the costs to go into making what really is a labor of love. for me. And I think, you know, beyond any commercial benefits that Bleacon might get from having their name mentioned a few times, I think a lot of Why they're doing this is that they just appreciate the community that we're part of and just want to support us for those reasons as well.

So lots happening here, but do check out the rest of the podcast for what I think you'll find is an interesting conversation with Kirsten Newquist, CEO of Identive. Bye. The MrBeacon Ambient IoT podcast is sponsored by Bleacon, who enable physical products to communicate with cloud applications using Bluetooth Low Energy. And by Ambient, we connect people that use...

products with the people that make them using AI and ambient IoT. Kirsten, thanks so much for coming on the podcast. It's great to have you on, Mr. Beacon. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me.

I have been a long admirer of your company. When I left Wiliot, it was because I... was really excited about the future of this whole digital to physical convergence thing that we're all working on. And I think that Identiv is a very interesting company that's positioned to... to kind of do this early scaling of a world where we're starting to put electronic identifiers on more and more things.

You know, with that comes a lot of complexity, and that's what your company has managed to solve, along with the ability to then scale it. So since you're at the helm of the company, I'm delighted to get a chance to talk to you. And I think it's like... Is it like roughly a year of being at the helm? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Well, a year and one month, I guess. I'm just looking at the date on my computer. Yeah, so I was going to say exactly a year, but no, one year and one month.

Yes, I'm in it now, fully in it. Well, one of the tasks that...

before someone that's in charge is actually explaining what your company does, how do you explain that to people typically when they're not familiar with Identif? Yeah, so Identif, what we do is we do specialized IoT. inlays, tags and labels. And when I talk about specialized, what that really means is a little bit kind of referring to how you just described the company. You know, we have some wonderful competitors out there that have done a great job with the real standard.

UHF or even HF inlays, tags and labels. And for us, where we really do have kind of some great skills and... can differentiate ourselves from our competitors is really around these highly customized and highly engineered. So when there are requirements that are needed in order to put that digital identifier onto a physical object, when there's really some kind of difficult requirements,

requirements, we have a very talented engineering and R&D team that sits in Munich that takes a look at what those requirements are and is able to really design the right product so that it can actually have a digital ID that can then be. read and uploaded into the cloud and everything else. So that's really our unique ability is making sure that we can do the engineering work up front to make sure that even products that could be very challenging.

to put on a digital ID, we're able to do so. And where we're seeing that more and more is some of these newer applications that are now starting to really come to fruition. And that's where we want to put our time and effort. those more challenging applications and letting us go in with our design capability, putting the right design together that we can then ultimately scale up as well.

And for those that aren't in the business, can you just briefly explain UHF and HF? Yeah, so there's different bandwidths of RFID, different radio frequencies that are used. And the frequency gives you different read rates, gives you the ability to read. you know, one or more, there's different capabilities that are there depending on the wavelength that you've got. And so...

And there tends to be, you know, kind of UHF, which is ultra high frequency, HF, which is high frequency. And then what we call the next generation technology, which is really around low energy Bluetooth, which is obviously where we got to work closely with. you at Williott. And really, there's not one technology that is better than the other. They all come with a different set of trade-offs and a different set of benefits.

And so depending on how you need to use that digital ID and how you want to, you know, kind of get the information from that digital ID is really what dictates the technology. And so once again, there's not one that's better than the other. They're just different. And where we really have focused our engineering work is around either high frequency or kind of next generation technology, although we do do some across all the board.

Well, actually, Identify was one of the first companies that I remember speaking to back in whenever it was, seven years ago, when we were just getting our feet under the table. And I was impressed by... uh the team's engineering uh prowess but at the time bluetooth wasn't part of the the picture and and i guess our you know the willyot technology was was nascent uh there

But I noticed that you made a recent announcement with another Bluetooth IC vendor, which was super interesting. And can you just maybe say a few words about that? Yeah, so definitely. Yeah, we just recently announced a partnership with InPlay. So InPlay has developed also a chip, a BLE chip. And obviously that doesn't take anything away from the work that we want to do and support for Williott, which also is really the cutting edge, you know, kind of BLE company that's out there.

But different business models, InPlay is a very different business model than the Williott business model. Williott is primarily interested in selling the data services, the SaaS platform. And the Williott inlay is sold to work with that data management platform. And some customers, that's great. They obviously need to have the data management in conjunction with the digital ID that goes on the product.

But not all customers need that. Some customers also have an interest in plugging the BLE data directly into their own platform. So it gives us the ability to support those where the Williat platform makes all the sense. the world to support those customers with that product and then some customers that may have

their own data platform that they're working on for different applications, the ability for us to supply inlays, labels, and whatever to those customers as well. So it gives us a little bit of a broader offering to the market. And... With this new technology, is this battery, is there a printed battery element? Yes. So these are active. So once again, yeah, different products. So primarily what we're focused on with InPlay is with batteries.

So an active tag as opposed to what we're doing with Williott, which is passive. You know, I'm a firm believer that there are different tools for different jobs. And so having a tool chest where you can pick the right tool for the right job is the best. place to be in and there are examples where having a very low cost printed battery bluetooth offering is just going to make sense and there's going to be others where you want to really drive to the lowest cost of uh

of inlay and you have the ability to, there's sources of energy that you can harvest. And that's when I think Williott comes to the fore. And so having, you know, that range of offerings is...

I think, really good when you've got customers coming to you with a whole different set of problems. Absolutely, yes. So in terms of that specialized... iot then why is i'm i've never quite understood why it is you guys are So good at it you are. What is it? What goes into having the capabilities to solve these engineering problems? And maybe you can just talk a little bit more about that. heritage and the competencies that you have that actually make specialized iot a real thing

Yes, I think there's two different areas. I think certainly we have some really talented engineers who sit in our R&D center, our innovation center, just outside of Munich. So I think really being clever with being able... to optimize the antenna design, kind of optimize the materials.

ensuring we're choosing kind of the right chip that goes into it. So I think there's really some great engineering design capability that goes into it. And we have some pretty talented folks with a lot of experience. I think the second piece is on the scale-up side. So some of these more complex devices, these more complex inlays, they're multi-component. And this multi-component manufacturing is also something that we have some expertise at our manufacturing facility.

So some really tremendous process engineers who are able to develop, you know, kind of the appropriate... manufacturing process so that we can actually manufacture these in the most cost-efficient way as possible. So I'd say it's those two areas, great, you know, kind of design capability up front, being able to really listen to the customer requirements. and take those in and develop the right product.

the sister engineers, brother engineers sitting in Thailand that have the ability to then make sure that we develop the right manufacturing process. I'd also say we are also just... focused on this area. And I think some of our other competitors, as they've done really well with some of the high volume UHF standard applications, that's been a tremendous amount of their bandwidth has been.

focused on there to execute in those areas with excellence. And so it's given us, I think, the opportunity to really focus on some of these other more challenging applications that require some more engineering and really get in there and develop some of these products that enable some of these applications to really move forward.

Yeah, I won't embarrass him, but I know that one of your senior engineers, someone I had the pleasure of working with at Williott and really had a huge part in teaching Williott how... take all the expertise that they had with extremely low power chip design. basically what you needed to do to make that work in the mass production of extremely low cost.

tags. So you definitely have some great talent over there in Germany. I'm interested in what you're doing in Thailand. And not just because I've really enjoyed watching White Lotus and its reawakened fascination with that part of the world. Why Thailand? And you were operating in Singapore as well. You still are operating? Yeah. So initially the manufacturing location was in Singapore and it had been there, you know, for quite a few years, I think with some pretty talented.

people in production in Singapore. But the reality is the cost structure in Singapore is high compared to manufacturing in many other locations in that region. I always kind of equate manufacturing in Singapore. is a little bit like manufacturing in the U.S. and Manhattan. It's just not going to give you, you know, especially with these, you know, kind of manufacturing types of margins that we have, we have to be in the most cost competitive.

area that we can possibly be in so thailand it's you know it's got a much more competitive cost structure really talented people there's been you know Quite a bit of RFID production that has taken place in Thailand and in the Bangkok area for many years. And so there is talent, both from a production standpoint as well as an engineering standpoint.

And we were very fortunate to bring on a very seasoned leader that was able to, you know, kind of pull in some very experienced talent from Bangkok and really help us get our site up and running in Thailand. So we opened it just about a year ago. year ago, we've spent the last 12 months

transitioning all of our production from Singapore over to Thailand. It's gone remarkably smoothly. That's tough work, and we've really had a great team effort, both on the Singapore side and the Thailand side, to get it transitioned. And we expect to be largely done transitioning everything by the end of this quarter. And we'll be then fully operational and fully producing in our Thailand facility. And have you been watching White Lotus?

You know, I watched the first season, which I enjoyed very much. I have been told many times that the third season is in Thailand, so it's definitely high on my list to watch it. It's a very cool country. I've been there three times since I started a year ago. It's a wonderful country, great culture. The food is fantastic. The people are so friendly. I've really enjoyed it. So it is a country that's worth visiting for sure. It's on my bucket list.

I want to go back to a point which I was listening to your earnings call and... As a marketeer, I really, you know, you have to communicate some pretty complex things. This is like a super high tech area you're working in. You're working across different verticals. I really like the way that you have reduced what is very complicated to the perform, accelerate, transform mantra, slogan, strategy.

little bit more about that anything where there's three i think you're off to a good start with branding and what but what does it actually mean yeah so one of the things kind of coming into the business and and you know really needing to kind of align on our go-forward path. I spend quite a bit of time with the team developing our growth strategy.

and making sure that we weren't trying to do everything for everyone all the time, which was a little bit what was happening, I think, as I came into the company. I really wanted to make sure that we were focused on kind of the right verticals, the right customers.

and where we really truly had a competitive advantage and we could really support our customers with their growth objectives. So did quite a bit of work and ultimately came up with our growth strategy that boiled down into these three different buckets. So perform, that's all about.

our existing customers, making sure that we're supplying them with excellent quality product, providing them high service levels, making sure that we're supporting them with their next generation product development, making sure that with our... partners that we're doing everything we can to support that, making sure we have the right infrastructure in place so that we can operate as efficiently and effectively as possible. So that's really all about perform.

then accelerate was really where we wanted to invest in growth and instead of you know like trying to do everything, we really narrowed it down to three key initiatives. So one of the initiatives was around focusing on three high-value segments within the healthcare market.

A second one was three high-value applications that were not healthcare, and then really expanding our BLE capabilities and our multi-component manufacturing capabilities, because that's really at the heart of our competitive advantage. We want to make sure that we... We continue to invest in it. We continue to add the appropriate resources and that we have the cutting edge manufacturing capabilities to support it. So it was really those three key initiatives.

And we put a team and identified those applications, what the addressable market was, and really put together our growth plans to support, you know, kind of incremental investments in those areas. So that was Accelerate. Transform was really about being able to take some of the new capital that came from the sale of our physical security side of the business and really helping us expedite our growth plan, specifically with M&A, tech and M&A. So really looking for opportunities.

opportunities that increased our scale, utilized our new Thailand manufacturing facility. expanded our product portfolio. And of course, as all our investors want, that there are some synergies involved as well. So perform about the current business, accelerate where we want to grow organically, and then transform as how are we going to grow and ultimately.

transform the business with the help of Inorganic and M&A. So that was Perform, Accelerate, Transform. It's been a great framework to help us communicate internally and making sure that everyone is very clear with where do they fit into. this overall framework that we have, making sure that we're communicating very clearly where we want to focus on, and sometimes, as importantly, where we don't want to focus on.

And then it's also been very helpful with our investors to really lay out for our investors. How are we growing? Where are we growing? We just recently put out some metrics as well to show how we're making progress across the strategic growth framework. So it's been a very helpful tool.

to use it as we go on our journey forward. And the divestment, I assume that decision predated your joining the company. Is that right? Yeah, that was actually what kind of... brought me into the company, quite frankly. So Identive was a larger business, public company. It had a physical security business, kind of access control business, and then it had this RFID business. And the company was really founded around the physical...

access, the physical security side of it. And the CEO who was running the company really had come up through that business. Somewhere along the lines, they had acquired a small RFID business, thinking there'd be some good synergies between the two of them. But I think ultimately...

what they realized as they got into it is it's really two very different businesses and it ultimately was there wasn't enough leadership bandwidth there wasn't enough you know kind of investment capital available to really do justice to both of those businesses

while still being a public company. So about a year and a half ago, maybe two years ago now, they had made the decision to sell off the physical security side of the business and then take the capital that would come in from the sale of the physical security side. was roughly $140 million.

put it on our balance sheet, and then our investors were generally supportive of us taking that capital and investing it in the RFID business so that we could really grow and expand into our specialized IoT business. So really a great opportunity for me to be able to come in and build the business. We have some capital on the balance sheet.

and move forward. And so they brought me into the company when it was clear that that transaction was going to go forward. And the old CEO went with the physical security side and it opened up this position to run the business. Very cool.

Hi, this is Amanda Rosevere, host of On BD with ALF, and we're currently being sponsored by Market Reach. At ALF Insight, we know how important it is to choose the right marketing tools for your campaign. Mail has helped many top CMOs achieve tough marketing tasks.

And in Totally Mailed It, a series of interviews with successful marketers, they share their stories and the secrets behind delivering results and business growth with mail. Find out more at marketreach.co.uk forward slash totally mailed it and unleash the magic. of mail for your brand. Here we are. Another train delay. Not a problem for Claire. Phone in hand, ready to play the free Coral Rewards Grabber. Loose wrist, firm grip. Taxbook.

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I want to... talk a bit about values you know one of my formative experiences the company where i worked at for gosh maybe 14 years which is like a terribly long time in technology years you know one of the things that i loved about working at that company was that they were

committed to values and it was well i don't want to talk about that but i do want you to talk about you know the the the values approach that you have i i have a sense that there is when i talk to people in the company i feel like you guys are the good guys not that Everyone else is bad, but there's a cohesive, enthusiastic vibe. And I think that comes frequently from people feeling like there's... this set of principles or values. Is that something that you have explicitly focused on?

Yeah, it's really important to me. I think, you know, in any organization, it's not just about what you do, it's how you do it. And look, you know, I want to win as much as anyone else. And I want to see success, you know, not only. for our investors but our employees and our customers i'm all in and that can be part of your values exactly yeah And so that is, I guess, an important part of the value and definitely something we're all driving towards. But it's how you do it, I think, is.

equally as important. And there's a few things that kind of rise up to the top to me. Something that I'm a big believer in is this kind of grit and determination. When you're all truly aligned, you all have a common vision. It's amazing.

what you can get done just by sheer willpower and determination and perseverance. I've always had kind of this value around grit and determination and let's all come together. Let's all work through the difficulties. And so I think there's something around this grit. determination. It's always been a value that I really talk through. And I've seen how that can really create, you know, kind of positive results with that real determination.

Another one that's really important to me is, and as someone who raised four kids throughout my career, is a little bit of this work-life balance and flexibility. And I know, I think more recently, I've heard some of the big CEOs.

out there who are kind of pulling back a little bit on that concept. I'm a big believer in that concept. I'm a big believer that in order to be successful in a career and in order to add a lot of value to a company, you have to also have a very healthy... personal life.

And I do think, you know, for people who have, well, everyone has a family. I do think being realistic with there are things that sometimes have to be done during work hours. So go ahead, knock yourself out, go make it happen. Go spend the time that you need. Get back.

on your computer later on and you can make up the time later. I've always been a big believer in offering that flexibility. I've always had bosses through my career that gave me that flexibility, which allowed me to kind of continue to progress. And I also think work-life balance. We can all work.

really, really, really hard for certain periods of time, but it can't be the norm. It can't be constantly. So I'm a big believer in kind of work-life balance, flexibility, making sure that we're all can be successful in the workplace and we can also be successful in our... home life and then the last one that's super important to me is integrity you know we need you know we need to make sure that we're doing everything you know like

with integrity, top of mind, making sure that we're always honest, that we're honest with ourselves, honest with our customers, we're transparent. When issues arise, we bring them out on the table. You know, we make sure we address. them and really making sure that every single step along the way that we're doing it with integrity kind of first and foremost. And it's really important to me that that is, you know, kind of front and center. So I'd say those are kind of the three.

kind of most important values to me. They were definitely existed in some of my previous businesses. And certainly for me, as I stepped into the CEO role, just front and center to me. Grit and determination, flexibility, work-life balance, and integrity. That's really good to hear. And I think, you know, values-based leadership has got a little bit of a bad name because it's been done badly in some places. But to me...

One of the key things about making values work in a company is it's got to come from the top. And when it does, then people understand this is real. The company I worked at got bought by IBM 25 years ago. It was like a billion-dollar pioneer in a technology that's now in all our phones and everything. And I can guarantee you if you... get any significant number of the people that worked at that company together, they'll talk about the values and they'll...

They'll talk in very similar terms to the ones that you talked about. And it's about a balanced set of values because we have to make money. We have to deliver results. And we can be proud of it, but also if we can do it knowing that there's real people that we're working with and get that balance right, then I think it's going to pay dividends for you. in hiring and retention and productivity and just working smart.

Yeah. And I do believe, you know, you can't just have a set of values that sit on a PowerPoint slide or sit on your website. Like you have to be acting them every day and showing that you believe in them every single day. And I think.

by leadership showing and living by these values, it does get adopted more broadly within the entire organization. And they're proud of it, right? Like they're proud and they want to, you know, they want to live by those values as well. And, you know, you know, ultimately. I think the values that we have will support and enable our success in the long term. Yeah, well, I applaud you for that.

So, you know, long term, that's a tough phrase these days. Predicting what's going to happen in the future is like really hard at the moment. I always love asking CEOs about what their view is of the future. What are your views about what's going to happen in the future and how is that driving what you're doing with the company?

Yeah, I mean, certainly this current environment is challenging, right? We just had kind of the big tariff announcement on April 2nd, massive tariffs, and then things have been all over the place. You know, I think the, you know, kind of the concern with, you know, potential recession is challenging. So definitely this is a very challenging, you know, kind of macroeconomic environment. And it reminds me a little bit of kind of...

that COVID time period, right? Like we were all trying to figure out like what was going to happen. Is this a short-term issue, a longer-term issue? So I think in a way, some of that managing through COVID gives us a little bit of a framework for what do we need to do to manage through this. And I think it's a little bit of, you know, you have to plan for the worst and hope for the best. You know, be really smart about it.

But it is really challenging because we don't know where things will stand in two weeks, four weeks, six weeks. Obviously, we produce product in Thailand. We import about a quarter of that into the U.S. So this whole tariff thing does have implications. for us and we're working really hard to make sure that we're mitigating whatever the final

the final resolution of the situation will be. So that's definitely a challenge at the moment. But I do think ultimately, you know, kind of these macro trends that we see that really support the growth of IoT, the growth of RFID, these macro trends. you know, kind of, you know, this increased digitization of everything, expansion of IoT, you know, kind of increased regulation that they need technology to help compliance, you know, kind of the increased.

focus on counterfeits and technology required. to make sure those aren't supported, kind of the sustainability kind of trends that are out there. These are all these big macro trends that are really supporting the growth for our industry. And and I don't see these trends going away despite some tariffs and despite some of the uncertainty we have. So I think these trends.

that really are creating a great opportunity space for us. They continue. We believe we have the right set of capabilities that allow us to really win in the areas that we're focused on. I think we've gotten... very clear with where we do want to focus. So I still, despite this uncertainty, I remain very optimistic about our long-term opportunity. I think the opportunity space is great. I think we have the right capabilities. we're focused in the right areas.

We do have some nice funding on our balance sheet, which gives us a little bit of time to really invest and grow and making sure we're growing in the right areas. So I'm very optimistic about the business for the long term. And definitely there's these challenges we have to get. through, but I remain quite optimistic. I agree. And I think no matter what we do here in the States, then the drive towards digital product passports and the fact that there's legislation that is mandated.

their usage is quite a unique thing. I think it's going to be tough for businesses to get up to speed, to learn. But I think it's going to drive a level of automation and efficiency that will pay real dividends and people will get creative and also see that what they can do can go.

beyond compliance. One of the last areas I wanted to pick your reins on is healthcare. It's something that you've spent a long time working on. I think we've all got a vested interest in healthcare getting better and costs coming down. And there's no doubt that automation is one of the keys to that. So what are the areas that are interesting? From your perspective, where Auto-ID is getting traction and can be used in healthcare to make it better?

Yeah. So, yeah, it's really interesting. I think this whole healthcare sector, we're just seeing more and more indications of companies that are really... you know, kind of seeing the benefit of IoT, of smart devices, of RFID. And so definitely as we're seeing this traction and interest, I think it's a really cool space to be in because it... can make a difference, make a difference in terms of, you know, patient safety, in terms of, you know, patients getting the right.

treatment and ensuring that the right drug gets to the right person. So lots of opportunity. The specific areas that we're focused on, there's three of them. So one of them is really around pharmaceutical cold chain management. pharmaceutical industry and drug pipeline is growing and growing in these kind of large molecule types of pharmaceuticals. These are organic materials. They tend to be very expensive. They tend to be very effective.

You know, you've probably read, you know, kind of about some of these newer treatments and their ability to really solve some of these, you know, kind of life-threatening illnesses, cancers, and so on. But these types of drugs also require very, very careful monitoring through the supply chain. They're very expensive. They need to be monitored from a temperature perspective, from a humidity perspective, from...

a location perspective. And so that's definitely an area that we're very intrigued about is really ensuring, you know, that these drugs can get monitored through the supply chain at the right condition, at the right location, and they can get where they need to go. There are some statistics out there that some of these drugs that do require this very careful temperature monitoring, up to 20% to 30% of them end up having to be...

thrown away because they haven't been able to maintain the proper temperature throughout the time of the supply chain. So that's one very interesting area to us. Another very interesting area to us is around medication adherence, especially for drugs. that are delivered at home. So once again, with these organic compounds that need to be delivered, they tend to have to be delivered intravenously, which means through some kind of auto-injector or syringe.

And they're more often than not now having to be delivered by the patient or a caregiver in the home setting. And so these smart labels that allow for authentication that the person who's gotten the drug is... the right drug, it hasn't expired. You know, it hasn't been recalled and through the RFID technology can get direct access to caregivers or care providers if they need some help in delivering it. It also really helps with adherence.

ensuring that the drug is being taken at the right time, right location. So that's a whole area that we're very intrigued with. We're working with a couple of pharmaceutical companies right now on making these auto-injectors smarter, making these pillboxes smarter.

to ensure that this delivery at home is done appropriately and accurately. And then the third area that we're really interested in is around the consumables that the medical devices that are in a hospital setting need to use. So many medical devices...

diagnostic test machines, they use consumables. Those medical device manufacturers want to make sure it's their consumable as opposed to a competitor's. That's what's been approved by the regulatory agencies and also from a patient safety perspective. So it's a little bit the printer. cartridge printer model, but for hospitals who use medical devices and diagnostic test equipment, and they want to ensure that they're using the right consumable for the right patient for the right test.

for the right procedure. And so our technology can really help ensure that that happens. I can't wait. These are important areas and my mother's going through a whole health thing. And one of the things that we kind of resolved is... We need to make sure she stays at home as much as possible, because going into hospitals can be pretty grim, even with the wonderful people.

are trying to make that work. So having more automation and visibility and, you know, all the incredible drugs that are being developed and it doesn't work well. Are they actually being taken? Are they being administered properly? Exactly. And to your point exactly, you're seeing more and more care is being pushed to the home setting.

largely is a great thing because at a home setting, you know, you can have your family helping you out. You get, you know, the food and the attention, you know, from your own family and caregivers. But at the same time, there's risks associated with it. well. And so I think kind of the technology that we've developed can really help ensure that it's taken accurately.

it's the right dose, it isn't counterfeit, all those, and that it's being taken according to the prescription and the doctor's orders. So I think a lot of good can come from the technology and the RFID.

automation solutions that are attached to that kirsten i think a lot of people will be watching this who are jealous of what you've achieved you're the ceo of a public company and i know that's probably not as fun as it sounds because you've got the weight of the world on your shoulders but

Nonetheless, we're in a country where that's kind of the rock stars of the CEOs. So I think people would be interested to hear how you... got there did you always want to run a company when you were in college or school or whatever I don't think necessarily it was a stated ambition of mine in college. And I would say as my career kind of progressed and I kind of really started to enjoy kind of being part of a team to build a business and grow.

a business, you know, kind of I saw more and more I really did enjoy that leadership role and really enjoyed, you know, kind of getting input, bringing people together and, you know, kind of. collectively achieving your goals like that was very satisfying so I think somewhere along the way you know kind of that leadership role became very interesting and attractive to me and so I think ultimately you know kind of whether it's leading a business or leading a

vision within a big company, you know, or being president or CEO of a private company, like all of that was interesting. And I think something that I was interested in doing. i don't think i ever specifically said oh i need to do it in a public company setting

And I think now that I'm in this setting, I think, you know, there's some good sides to it, but there's also some very big challenges about it. And I would say in most of my previous experience, you know, kind of as I grew a business, like in my previous job, Avery Dennison, of course, you'd have.

have to go to the corporate leadership team and, you know, get approval for funding to invest or, you know, give updates. You know, prior to that, I did a private equity back roll up. I wasn't the CEO, but I was part of the leadership team. And of course, we'd have to, you know, go. go talk to the private equity firms and kind of get their input and they're okay to invest money. And prior to that, I actually did a VC-based startup. So again, you had investors you had to go to.

I think the challenge with a public company is it's not just kind of one group or maybe two groups of investors that you have to kind of... keep updated and ensure you're aligned and have the right strategy and, you know, put your business case together. A public company, it's many. You've got many different investors and they all have a different, perhaps many of them.

have a very different, you know, kind of thought on how you should be building and growing the business. So it's a lot more, you know, kind of investors to keep happy and keep communicating to and be consistent with your communication. That has been an interesting learning for me as I've gotten into kind of this new role. So I'd say long answer to your very short question of did I ever imagine doing this? I think definitely kind of ultimately leading a business or a company.

was something that was definitely appealing to me. The public company piece of it. Yeah, not necessarily so. All the challenges of leading a company, but that spotlight and just more stakeholders and so forth. what were the things that you did in your career that you think best prepared you for the job that you're doing at the moment Yeah. So, you know, and I'd say, you know, as I kind of just mentioned, you know, kind of quickly, you know, probably three.

Three key roles that I've had. So one of them, you know, part of my last job within Avery Dennison, I was there for about 17 years. Kind of the majority of that time, I actually built their medical business. So, you know, there was a few different groups. within the big organization that had been working on various medical products.

and medical materials. And so ultimately, I had been part of corporate strategy where I was supposed to be identifying new growth businesses for the organization and putting together these different medical pieces into a single business and then really driving the growth.

was one of the key jobs that I had. And so that was really starting, you know, almost from scratch and really building up, you know, what became over 100 million of sales over the course of six or seven years. So, you know, that experience, and we did some M&A, small M&A. We did some integration. We developed new products. We did some big partnerships with KOEM. So that work definitely prepped me for this role. And as I said, you know, kind of prior to Avery Dennison, I did a PE-backed roll-up.

where we, you know... purchased some smaller, you know, kind of privately held mom and pop type operations and combine them into one. Obviously, a lot of integration work there. And then we ultimately sold it to Pitney Bowes. And then prior to that, you know, as I mentioned, I did a VC back. startup, a part of the team, not leading either of those. But I think a lot of experience in really building businesses. And obviously, at my current role as CEO of Identive, we've got a great...

foundation, but it's really about how do we build this and grow this and really turn it into a meaningful and exciting business. So I think it's all that kind of business building experience that I've always really enjoyed. And that's what I'm...

bring it to the table. Wonderful. Well, thanks for double clicking on that. Okay, now to my favorite part of the show, which is the three songs that have made an impact on you or memorable or what were the songs that you ended up choosing? I know that was such a great question. And I had a lot of fun with it. I actually had quite quite a few and I have narrowed it down. So I'd say this first song, which.

Came out, interestingly enough, in 1988, which was when I graduated from college. It's going to make sense in a second. And it was written by Bobby McFerrin, and it's Don't Worry, Be Happy. And it's a very simple song, and it's got kind of a simple melody.

And not a lot of instrumentation, but a very happy kind of thing. And of course, when you're graduating from college, you're full of worry, right? Like, where am I going to work? Am I going to be able to survive? Can I pay my rent? Will I like to work? Am I going to be any good at it? So you have all this worry. And I think this song kind of coming out right at that time that I was graduating, like, you know what? Don't worry. Let your anxiety go. It's not that the problems are going to go.

away or you should ignore the problems. But if you approach them with an optimistic view, a smile on your face, you know, they actually maybe will make things a little bit better and it'll get you through this time period a little bit easier. So I've always loved... that song i love you know kind of the reggae kind of uh spirit to it and and it's one that i've tried to lift by as everything kind of gets thrown your way you know what just yeah you know try to try to approach it with a can do and

spirit. But I think the worrying thing is... A lot of leaders, they worry a lot. And that's kind of the thing that motivates them and gets them to do all the things that they don't really like doing. And it's that kind of voice in the back of your head. But it's about moderating it, isn't it? And if you don't, then... it can be just really counterproductive. So good, good therapeutic song as well as a great song.

Well, thank you. Yeah, so that was kind of my first. Then the second one I picked, which I just, I love, you know, kind of the melody. It's a big anthem kind of song. And it came out in 1972, written by Bill Withers, and it's Lean on Me. And, you know, and I think that one is just such a great song. It's kind of this heartfelt...

anthem, you know, really about friendship, support, and really mutual reliance. It's like, hey, lean on me. I'll help you out during your difficult times. And then you know what, I'm going to need to lean on you someday. I'm going to have a problem that, you know, I'm going to need help.

with so it's really about i think you know kind of supporting each other friendship helping each other and how important it is to help each other through some difficult times they will come you know they will be there and let's lean on each other to really move things So it's just a great song. Yeah. A great old time song. So very cool. And what's number three.

And number three, which is a more recent song. So this one actually came out in 2015 and was written by Andra Day and it's Rise Up. So also a big, you know, kind of anthem really about resilience, hope. perseverance, you know, when things seem really tough and you've got all these problems, you know, kind of stick with it, you know, continue through, rise up.

Yeah. And move forward. And obviously it's just been a song that is heard all over the place. I think a big song of empowerment, you know, for the women's movement, for Black Lives Matter, you know, when you've had, you know, these challenges in your life.

you know, kind of hang in there, like push forward, you know, you will get through it, rise up and you can overcome these challenges. So I love that song. It's a very inspiring song. It's really about grit and determination. And, you know, I'm fortunate.

I haven't had, you know, I haven't, I came from a place of a lot of support and so on family support. So I don't think I've had some of the challenges that the song refers to, but we all have, you know, kind of difficult situations or things that are thrown our way. And this song. is really about, you know what, hang in there, work hard, persevere, and rise up and you will overcome. So I think it's just a great song.

It is. And I always think that music is a wonderful tool to help us get things straight in our heads often. It's just another way into...

untangling our complicated brains. And so I'm going to add that to my motivational song list. That's great. Well, Kirsten, thanks so much for joining us on the podcast. It's been a real pleasure talking to you. Thank you very much. I've enjoyed it myself. Thank you. So there you go. That was the interview with Kirsten, who I think is a really smart, nice person, as well as leading an interesting company.

So I've been trying to foster this thing of talking a bit about the music I've been listening to as a short segment at the end of this show. And this is what I've been listening to. It's actually a...

boxed CD set. For those of you that are listening, you're missing out on seeing some incredible packaging. This box is actually the size of a traditional British phone box and it's actually got LEDs that are making the the phone box sign flicker on and off which is kind of amusing and even more amusing is this incredible list of bands that have produced four discs worth of of brit pop and they range from inspirational carpets primal scream the lars the sundays teenage

fan club, and even a group called Gay Dad. So there you are. Interesting music if you're into British post-punk. Time for me to wrap up and to thank Aaron Hammock, who has been editing this podcast for years. So thank you, Aaron, for all the work you do. And thank you to everyone that's still watching and listening. If you have been, thanks for doing it.

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