Digital Enterprise Capabilities: Beyond IT with Matt Lasmanis

How do today’s biotech companies cultivate innovation and harness digital tools for strategic growth?

In this episode, we dissect the pivotal role that digital enterprise capabilities play in transforming a company's approach to challenges in the life sciences sector.

As I chat with Matt Lasmanis, Chief Technology & Innovation Officer at Sage Therapeutics, we delve into the transformative power of technology within the biotech industry. 

Matt shares his invaluable insights on strengthening a company's data strategy, investing in AI, and integrating advanced analytics to drive informed decisions. We're exploring the notable shift from the traditional IT department to a model that embodies digital and enterprise capabilities, underlining how crucial this evolution is for a company like Sage. 

Matt's insights on the cultural shift within the biotech industry and the necessity of a growth mindset promise to be enlightening for leaders and innovators alike.

This episode is a must-listen for anyone looking to understand how strategic digital transformation positions a company at the forefront of innovation. Rediscover the potential within the biotech industry by tuning into our engaging conversation.

Specifically, this episode highlights the following themes:

• The strategic implementation of data analytics and AI within Sage Therapeutics
• Nurturing a culture of innovation within life sciences companies
• The strategic role of cybersecurity and privacy in technology investment decisions

Links from this episode:

• Get to know more about Steven Swan: https://www.linkedin.com/in/swangroup
• Get to know more about Matt Lasmanis: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattlasmanis
• Learn more about Sage Therapeutics:
  https://www.sagerx.com

Transcript

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Matt Lasmanis [00:00:00]:
I think what teams need to think about is value doesn't just come from the volume that you produce. That's not a one to one equation. You've got to think about what is the priority of that thing that I'm working on, and how does that ladder up to our strategic objectives, and how does that help us do something fundamentally different that I couldn't do yesterday? That's kind of what makes good strategy, in my view. You got to pick what you bet on, and you've got to pick what you progress. And all those things need to be kind of laddered into what the company's trying to achieve strategically.

Steve Swan [00:00:32]:
Welcome to Biotech Bytes, where we speak with it leaders within the biotech industry about their thoughts and feelings around technology trends affecting our industry today. I'm your host, Steve Swan, and today I have the distinction of chatting with Matt Lasmanis, the Chief Technology and Innovation Officer from Sage Therapeutics. Matt, welcome. Thank you for joining us.

Matt Lasmanis [00:00:52]:
Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.

Steve Swan [00:00:54]:
Yeah, no, I'm excited to have a conversation with you. So I think we should probably start off just sort of generally, you know, asking Matt about Matt, you know, Matt's background, where Matt came from and that sort of thing.

Matt Lasmanis [00:01:05]:
Oh, my gosh. Yeah. So I started. I kind of started in the tech area in the publishing industry, actually in New York City. So I ran digital platforms for a major publishing company right around the time Amazon and other companies were kind of really disrupting the publishing space. Did that for a number of years. Absolutely loved it. And then kind of life events, other things.

Matt Lasmanis [00:01:26]:
I took my wife and I to Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania, where she's from. And I realized pretty quickly, if we're going to live in the Philly area, there's a couple industries that are really going to make a big impact. I've always been fascinated by healthcare and life sciences, and so I started at a major pharmaceutical company. I thought I'd be there for a couple of years. Steve. And they kept finding me cool stuff to do, so I stayed 19 years. Various roles, all digital data, analytics, technology enabling. Half of that time was in research and development.

Matt Lasmanis [00:01:56]:
Half of that time was in commercial. And after about 1920 years, I was looking for something kind of new to do. I really wanted to give back to the brain health area. Like many people out there, Alzheimer's, other types of conditions have touched my family's lives, and I really wanted to see if there was something I could do to make an impact. And, you know, life's funny, all this stuff is going on and an interesting opportunity opened up at a company called Sage Therapeutics to take on a new challenge, which was actually building out all their digital and enterprise capabilities to scale the company. So that was back at the end of 2020. Been there about three years, and it's been an amazing journey ever since.

Steve Swan [00:02:33]:
So when you, when you, and I hope you don't mind, I'll dig into this a little bit here. So when you decided to leave, you know, the larger establishment and go to this, what was it that attracted you? I mean, yeah, of course there are therapeutic areas, but was there a challenge or was there going to be something that you saw coming down the road that you said, I can really make an impact here?

Matt Lasmanis [00:02:53]:
Yeah. So I think for the next chapter of my career, I was looking to do something new and different. Like I said, I think neuroscience and brain health is something that I'm personally passionate about. So I was interested in opportunities there. But what was really intriguing about and Sage and what they wanted to do was it wasn't just about it, and it wasn't just about tech. It was about really building the right kinds of digital capabilities into the company as it was emerging and as it was kind of scaling in a real green field sort of way. So I think having been at major large companies and corporations, I was really interested to make an impact at a smaller scale company and see what I could do to really change the operating model of the firm. And I think the other thing that really attracted me to Sage is it's filled with people that are really passionate around brain health and really want to make an impact.

Matt Lasmanis [00:03:46]:
And I think at the time, back in 2020, the leadership of the organization knew that digital data analytics were going to be really core to how they grew the company. They just didn't know how, and they needed somebody to come in and really build that all out for the firm. Over the longer term, the combination of all those things is really the sweet spot for me. I'm gravitated towards things. I'm passionate about where I can make a strategic impact. And the opportunity at Sage was really compelling from that perspective. It's been an amazing journey ever since.

Steve Swan [00:04:20]:
So now the data and the analytics, right?

Matt Lasmanis [00:04:23]:
Yeah.

Steve Swan [00:04:24]:
Some folks look at that and they'll say, well, that could be the genesis of AI where we are today. Right. Or what we're thinking about for AI. Or that could just be, you know, great data analytics, you know, depends on your semantics and where you're going with that. Right? Did you, did you see it that way? And do you see it that way? And has it evolved for you into an AI kind of thing, or is it something that's transcended that or different than that for you?

Matt Lasmanis [00:04:48]:
Yeah, I think, you know, stepping back from the AI specifically for a second, I think what I always coach teams on is, let's figure out the business problem we're trying to solve, like, what's the strategy, what's the objective? And, you know, I'm not one for chasing shiny objects all around the world, right. Or chasing trends. And I think there's a lot of, you can get yourself kind of lost in the forest that way pretty quickly. I think from my point of view, from a life sciences industry, it is an industry that's fueled by data, fueled by information and fueled by analytics from the very beginnings to where we're thinking about which out of these 10, 20, 30,000 molecular solutions is going to work all the way through to making sure that the marketplace is educated about that. There's just massive amounts of opportunities to be data driven along the way, whether it's Sage or any other company out there. The lifeblood of life sciences companies is fueled by data kind of inherently. So one of the first things we did at Sage was take a look at, they had a very strong it operational kind of team, desktops, laptops, infrastructure, that sort of stuff. But they really hadn't taken the opportunity to build out the data strategy, the data platforming, the AI and analytics yet.

Matt Lasmanis [00:06:05]:
And Sage at its core is based on a really strong understanding of neuroscience and molecular targets. We took the opportunity to say, hey, how can we maximize the utilization of that information across the value train across the company and put in the right data platforms to do that? So that was step one. And now step two, obviously, we do a lot of thinking about the right kinds of analytics to apply to those problems, you know, and in certain cases, we have found, you know, application of AI and those kinds of models makes a lot of sense for the types of things we're trying to solve for. But it's not like we treat, you know, not everything is a nail we're trying to hit with the AI, a hammer, you know what I mean?

Steve Swan [00:06:46]:
Right. Yeah, yeah.

Matt Lasmanis [00:06:46]:
No way that makes sense, but, yeah.

Steve Swan [00:06:49]:
So you took the foundation, so you had a core technology. It was there, it was in place, you had a great science core. Right. Sage's great scientific based company. You took your approach to it, to the science side. Right. You know, how do we solve these problems with our technology and our digital capabilities, and how do we continue to build that out, is what you're telling me. Right?

Matt Lasmanis [00:07:12]:
Exactly. Yeah. And in fact, we kind of outlaw the use of the term it at Sage, you know what I mean? So we technically don't even have an IT team anymore, although we do it work. It's a small part of, you know, my team's responsibilities. So that's there. But we don't actually call it it anymore. We call it digital and enterprise capabilities or DEc for short. And, you know, sometimes how you frame something, you know, tells you a little bit about what you're trying to do, you know? So from our perspective, the technology is important, the days, all those things are critical.

Matt Lasmanis [00:07:43]:
But it's the people, the process, the technology, the capability and bringing all those things together to say, you know, this is the strategic problem we're trying to solve. This is the strategy we're trying to enable. So how do we bring those things to bear to propel the company forward? So, yeah, it's interesting, when new employees come into sage, they've never heard the word it. If you ask them where the it department is, they couldn't, they couldn't tell you, actually, because they don't know. So it's been fascinating to watch that kind of cultural change as well across the company. But, yeah, it's been a really great, really great journey. And I think at this point we have the capabilities in place. We have the skill sets, the teams, and now it's about making sure that as we grow and scale, we're leveraging those to propel the company forward.

Matt Lasmanis [00:08:26]:
So, yeah, it's been fascinating.

Steve Swan [00:08:28]:
What do you think over that timeframe? Right. And we didn't really talk much about this, but what do you think over that timeframe has been? I don't know. I don't want to say the one technology, but sort of maybe the technology or the concept within it that's been most beneficial to your approach. Right. To being that catalyst, to being the one to help get you to that answer, because it sounds like you almost want to, and you haven't quite said this, I feel like you're saying this, but kind of starting with the answer and working our way backwards as to how we're going to get, to get that we know where we want to go. We just got to get there and we got to figure out how we're going to get there. But let's make sure we know where we're heading. Right.

Steve Swan [00:09:05]:
But what has been sort of the technology that you think has been the, you know, maybe there's several, I don't know, you know, that have really been the difference maker.

Matt Lasmanis [00:09:14]:
So we focus on three or four kind of key areas in my group. So one is about what I'll broadly call kind of the digital innovation area. That's fundamentally two things. How we show up in the marketplace with our digital experiences, as well as how we think about new types of sensors, wearables, those kinds of things to embed in our clinical and research development processes. So that's the. The digital innovation part. The second kind of focus area for us is the data analytics. And so that's from an enterprise perspective.

Matt Lasmanis [00:09:45]:
How do we bring all our data assets to bear across the company to solve complex scientific and business challenges? The third one is operational, right? So which includes the it part we kind of talked about before the it.

Steve Swan [00:09:59]:
Don't say that. Don't say that.

Matt Lasmanis [00:10:00]:
You know, clinical development, all those kinds of core foundational operational components in our operational error. And then kind of the fourth one is a little bit more cultural, which is we have a set of kind of core values at Sage, one of which is this thing forge new pathways. And that's about how do we think about innovation across the company, right? So how do we take that scientific, experimental mindset that we see in the science, and how do we apply that across the whole enterprise from a cultural point of view? So that's like a fourth thing that my team helps out on from kind of a process, and people change perspective across the company. I think it's like, how do you pick your favorite of your children? You know what I mean? When you boil all those things down, like we talked about before, they all require data at the base, foundational level of it. If you don't have the right capabilities to wrangle and bring your data together to integrate it across your organization operation, it's hard to extract the maximum amount of value across the other components of it. So I think for other teams out there that are thinking about their transformation journey and where they're trying to go, that core getting the data component of it right first for us anyway, in my experience, has been transformational to propelling the other aspects of what we're trying to do from a capability perspective.

Steve Swan [00:11:27]:
I hear a lot about the data from folks either having to go back, right, and retroactively clean up their data or having to get, you know, fill holes in their data, whatever it might be, right, because you're building all these great things, but you don't want to go towards the shiny new object, you know? But I see what you just said where it's, you know, your fourth component. Right. But you were talking, you know, it's more the soft skills, it's more building out the right attitude, and it's more about, you know, create the structure where folks can go and seek those answers as opposed to this is the box we have to fit in. That's not what we're looking for. We're looking for the right answer. We're not looking for to fit within that box. That's what it sounds like you're saying to me.

Matt Lasmanis [00:12:13]:
Yeah, exactly. And in that fourth kind of bucket of mindset, change, if you will, or cultural change, however you want to phrase it, here's an example. So one of the first things we did when we stood up the new team, we knew that there was a lot of big transformational things that we're going to try to do, build the right scalable capabilities for the company, but we needed some kind of way to run change management, change the culture, change the process, change the mindset, that kind of thing. And there wasn't a core part to doing that within sage at the time. So one of the things we created was this small team called the transformation office. So another one of the roles I was wearing at the time was kind of like transformation officer for the company, where you had this kind of soft skill, kind of change management capability that allowed you to run big transformational things. And the company hadn't been used to that at that point in time. So that was really successful, making sure that we had the right people in place to even show how to transform things and how to build a new set of capabilities for the firm.

Matt Lasmanis [00:13:12]:
So I can't underestimate. At the end of the day, you could have the right technology, have the right data, have the right analytics, have all these things. The people component is so critical to get right as part of the equation, you know, so it's something we put a lot of attention to, you know, throughout the whole process.

Steve Swan [00:13:29]:
But, yeah, a lot of folks have talked to me about training retail. Well, first landing the right person, but then training and retention, you know, to keep them. To keep them in the right, you know, going in the right direction. Now, with your transformation role, is, I mean, is that going to be, I mean, that's focused more on sort of, are you dictating what they're transforming to or are they figuring out what you're transforming? You know, what I'm saying is that this is.

Matt Lasmanis [00:13:54]:
Yeah, it's like, this is the $30,000 question of transformation. Like, sorry, no, no, I'll give you my perspective on it, you know, I think, you know, at the end of the day, what do we, what are we trying to do? Whether you run an it team or however you characterize the work that you do, you're trying to have a strategic impact for the firm that you're in, right. Like that. That is what we are trying to accomplish. And I think from like an enterprise transformation point of view, my feeling wasn't that you dictate that from the center, right. What you need to do as a company should be known, right. Like you should know that as part of your overall strategy and the teams that understand those concepts and content, they have that right. But what we were trying to do at the time, which I think was one of the more successful things we actually did, was bring the skills and tool sets and thinking to bear on how you get from like point a to point b.

Matt Lasmanis [00:14:49]:
You know, that was the critical aspect of making it happen, the execution aspect, if you will, you know, and now we've kind of evolved that thinking to going towards more product focused approach to digital products and that kind of stuff. But back then, even getting into how you transform the people, the process, the tech aspect of it was, was really critical and, and it was really having the right capabilities and skills and thinking to enable that stuff to happen versus dictating the exact thing that was going to occur. Yeah.

Steve Swan [00:15:21]:
Now do you think going forward as an industry and as a company, right. Do we have a lot of ground to cover as far as making those transformations from the biotech industry? You know what I'm saying?

Matt Lasmanis [00:15:32]:
Like personally, for me, I personally think we have a lot of ground to cover still. You know, I'll give you a small example if you will. So when I was starting out, like I said, I was in the publishing industry, which if you don't know much about publishing, it was one of the first areas to really be disrupted with digital and information transformation and that kind of stuff. Amazon, Amazon, you know, there were a lot of companies at that point in time really trying to change how we consumed information, published information, that kind of stuff. And so at the time there was a huge amount of upheaval and one of the things we were working on at the time were ebooks as an example, right, that everyone told us, you know, no one was ever going to read them, you could never sell them, you couldn't do anything with them. Sure enough now, you know, they're far outstripped, you know, paper book sales. But anyways, we were doing a lot of interesting advanced work back then. As a consequence and like I said, I shifted from that area of the market into life sciences, and I chose to work in research and development at the time in pharmaceuticals because I didn't know much about it.

Matt Lasmanis [00:16:42]:
So I spent ten years really trying to understand how R and D worked in life sciences and that kind of stuff. And that was a whole other aspect of digitization. Well, when I came back after those ten years to the commercial part of pharmacy, there were things we were still not doing in the pharmaceutical industry that we had been doing ten years previous to that when I left publishing, you know what I mean? So it just goes to show you there's a lot of research and studies on this, that certain industries, the more types of regulatory requirements and other things that are built into them, the slower they tend to adapt to change within the marketplace, you know. So I think since I was more on the commercial side of pharma and now coming into this role, I think we've done a lot of catch ups. So I think you start to see a lot of these kinds of techniques being adopted in large life sciences and large pharmaceutical players. Something tells me, though, that as we go the next 1020 years, we're going to have a lot of opportunities to really capitalize on digital analytics within life sciences. Just because industries that have gone through this previously are not even as data intensive as the life sciences industry is. There's just a lot of substrate of opportunity there, I think, for teams that can, to create a lot of value.

Steve Swan [00:18:06]:
You know what some of the folks have been talking to me about, if you have no comment on this, this is fine, but some of the folks have been talking to me about talking about data and getting some meaningful conclusions out of our data and utilize, to, quote unquote, squeeze more juice out of our data, using EMR and EHR data to really, you know, hey, this is what's happening with these patients who are doing this, this and this, maybe this means this or whatever. And, you know, some folks are talking to me saying, you know, that they feel that we're leaving something on the table with that. And they also feel that from an analytics and AI perspective, doing that kind of analysis on that data is real straightforward with the technology we have today. What are your thoughts there? I mean, have you even thought about something like that?

Matt Lasmanis [00:18:51]:
Well, I mean, whether it's EMR, Ehr data, irregardless of what the source of it is, I think what you're talking about is what I would call kind of real world data, right? And irrespective of the source why is RWD important? Well, if you think about it within the various life sciences processes, before a product gets to the marketplace, it's tested and it's tested through the various clinical trial studies and designs and those kinds of things, and it goes through the regulatory process. Well, that information is absolutely critical to understanding how those products work, how they're safe, how they're effective, etcetera. When those products get onto the marketplace, there's another huge opportunity to learn about their real world application and real world use. And I think over the last 1020 years, I think the firms have really come to the understanding that they need to learn about both. They need to learn about it in the clinical setting, and they need to learn about it as much as they can in the real world setting to make sure that as the industry moves forward, we're designing the best possible solutions to the most complicated biological problems that are out there. I think whether it's EHr, EMR, irrespective of the source, I think companies understanding how products operate in a real world setting, I think people have really started to understand how important that is. And you'll start to see people invest more and more in that, I think, in the next set of years.

Steve Swan [00:20:27]:
Sure. Sure. Now, as you built out your deck, your capabilities area, your digital capabilities, I'm going to go back to the actual technology itself. Right. Is there something more or even less right from a technology perspective that you think could help us moving forward in the future if we refine something a little bit better than how we have it today? Now, is that making AI better? Is that making. I don't know. I'm just going to. I'm going to go back to the old tried and true security.

Steve Swan [00:20:57]:
Is that making security easier to deal with? I don't know. Just wondering if there's something that we could do better that we think may free us up more to focus more on what you're focusing on, which is really the future?

Matt Lasmanis [00:21:11]:
Yeah, I mean, I think there's two kind of answers to that, I guess. I think what firms and companies have to focus on is many times very much customized to what they're trying to do. So what might be important for me at Sage could be less important for somebody at some other company.

Steve Swan [00:21:30]:
Fair enough. Yeah.

Matt Lasmanis [00:21:31]:
You know, it's not about kind of, you know, one brush for everything. I think it's, you know, what is this particular company trying to do? What's it trying to achieve and what thing is going to make the most impact for that company's stakeholders? Internal, external, you know, etcetera. Having said that, are there opportunities to improve across everything that we do in life sciences? Like, sure. Right.

Steve Swan [00:21:56]:
Nothing's ever perfect, right.

Matt Lasmanis [00:21:58]:
There absolutely are. I just think, you know, when you, when you're looking at a life sciences company, almost any company, I guess, and you're saying, what are the areas we could improve something from a people process, tech, data analytics point of view, you know, you really have to be choice for. Like, it's as important that the thing you choose to do as the thing you don't choose to do, you know, and that's what makes that, that's kind of what makes good strategy, you know, like making really purposeful choices about what you're gonna, what you're gonna invest in and what you're gonna to try to accomplish. Because, you know, none of us have, none of us have infinite resources out there, you know, and you've got to try to make the best of the resources that you have, and that's where you get impact from. You know, you mentioned cyber, I think, and that whole space, something that I think is going to be very, very critical to the, to the future of all industries, you know, and I think that area is something I try to look at as an enabler of the future, not just kind of an incoming requirement, you know? So I think companies that think about how can cyber approaches, security, privacy, et cetera, like how can we build the right kind of trust factors into the company. The folks that kind of think, you know, and be very choiceful about that, I think, are going to, that's going to pay dividends kind of down the line versus simply think of those as just kind of incoming requirements, you know, but it's all important. And, but what's more important is, you know, you make the right choices in terms of what you invest in.

Steve Swan [00:23:27]:
Sure. Yeah. And to your point, you know, lots of times, well, most of times, what you decide not to do right and save yourselves chasing your tails versus in.

Matt Lasmanis [00:23:37]:
Some ways, it's more important, you know, in some ways, because, you know, what, what tends to make teams less successful is they've got, you know, a wall full of 10 million things. There's a backlog that stretches the horizon. And I think what teams need to think about is value doesn't just come from the volume that you produce. That's not a one to one equation. You've got to think about what is the priority of that thing that I'm working on? How does that ladder up to our strategic objectives and how does that help us do something fundamentally different that I couldn't do yesterday. And that's got to be really choiceful. And along the way, you've got to pick, I'm not going to spend time on that. We're not going to do that.

Matt Lasmanis [00:24:26]:
We're going to be purposeful in this space. So that's what makes good strategy in my view. You got to pick what you bet on and you've got to pick what you progress. And all those things need to be laddered into what the company's trying to achieve strategically.

Steve Swan [00:24:41]:
You and I have talked about it a million times. It's like raising kids. Right? What do you, what are you going to focus on? I mean, you can't focus on everything and you can't teach every lesson. It's Warren Buffett always said you only swing at the pitches you want to swing at. You know, you don't swing it a few make sure you're going to hit it off the wall, you know, otherwise, don't swing at it. Right.

Matt Lasmanis [00:24:57]:
That's right. That's right.

Steve Swan [00:24:59]:
So I'm going to drop one in your lap here. Right. So I'm Steve Swan. I'm looking to work with Matt. Work for Matt. Why would I want to be there? Why do I want to work for Matt at stage right now?

Matt Lasmanis [00:25:12]:
Yeah. So, you know, I think from, from the sage perspective, what strikes me about the culture of sage that I found so compelling when I started nearly to a person, everyone is really driven by the passion for brain health there, you know? And I think if someone's out there, you know, if they're interested in making an impact in that part of the industry, like I was, like many of my peers are, it's hard for me to think of a better place to be to a person. Everyone has stories, is passionate, and really wants to make a difference. And you feel it when you walk around the building or you walk around the company or talk to people, it's inescapable, you know what I mean? So that part of it to me is just, it's hugely motivating for myself, my staff, the employees. I think the second part of it, within my team, specifically within the DEC organization, if you're interested in solving really complicated problems and being challenged to use your digital skills, your thinking skills, your strategic skills, your technological skills and your people skills, and you're looking to crack big problems that are going to help shape the path of an emerging company, that to me, is another big opportunity that sort of really draws people in. And you see people come in and they're you know, it's almost as a cliche, I guess, but you really see them doing some of the best work of their lives kind of that, you know, it draws on all their different experiences, and they're bringing all that to bear on the work that they do, you know, every single day. So I think that's compelling. And then thirdly, you know, we've talked about this before.

Matt Lasmanis [00:27:01]:
One of the things that we focus on in my team is the development of our people. So we have a series of foundational development, planning, succession planning, that kind of stuff. But on top of that, we've got what we call our workforce development program. So as an example, our cybersecurity workforce program takes folks that have absolutely no experience in cyber previously. They might be working in the help desk. They might be working somewhere else. They go through a training and certification program. They get to work on a really critical cybersecurity initiative for us.

Matt Lasmanis [00:27:34]:
And when they come out of that, they're certified at a certain level in cyber, they've got some hands on experience. They help out with the cyber team. And over time, now that we've been doing this, we've actually had somebody progress from working at the help desk, going through the workforce program, doing some part time work, and cyber actually into cybersecurity analysis for us as a career kind of progression. So that has been just amazing. Just the sense of accomplishment you see in the workforce when that kind of happens is it's super cool to see. And then, of course, beyond that, we've got our leadership development programs and everything else. But that third part of it has been cool.

Steve Swan [00:28:12]:
Yeah. With that third part of it, I mean, I don't know many, if any, companies that are doing that. There's got to be some, right? But I just don't know. But with that, that's just phenomenal. Why wouldn't you want to be there? Why wouldn't you want to stay there? I mean, if you're growing like that boy, let's, you know, again, I know I always go back to the parenting thing, right. And parenting and coaching kids, if they're having fun and learning something, they're coming back and they want you to be their coach every year. You know what I mean?

Matt Lasmanis [00:28:36]:
Absolutely. Absolutely. And it helps, too, from a business continuity, a resilience perspective, because, in essence, you have this opportunity to kind of cross share learnings, cross train across the organization. People wear new roles and new hats, and it's just super helpful, both personally and for the team. So it's, we've seen a lot of good output from that. Yeah.

Steve Swan [00:28:57]:
Because then the folks in security, they can turn to this person that just came, you know, came from the help desk a year ago, say, hey, listen, back off on them. This is what they're going through right now. It's that time of the month or year or quarter, whatever. They got to deal with some stuff. And I get it. I know what's going, you know, that kind of thing. I think that's awesome. It's great stuff.

Matt Lasmanis [00:29:13]:
Yeah, sure. And if, as we have new, you know, roles, you know, pop up in other teams, they can get some experience and. Yeah, and it's just, it's great. It's sort of, it has, it still has a start. It's not quite a startup anymore in terms of our corporate profile, but it still has aspects of that, you know, that kind of energy with it, too.

Steve Swan [00:29:31]:
So that's awesome.

Matt Lasmanis [00:29:32]:
Yeah, it's a great culture.

Steve Swan [00:29:34]:
We've got a really good culture now. So shifting away from the company back to, I'm just going to go big picture here on technology. Is there anything you think that we should cover on technology that we haven't, you know, from a biotech or anything you wanted to get in there because we're running a little, you know, we're getting flown bit.

Matt Lasmanis [00:29:54]:
Yeah, I was just saying, Steve, you know, we haven't really touched on this yet, and I wouldn't, maybe not technologically, but if you think about the next, let's just say next 20, you know, 10, 20, 30 years in the life sciences industry, you know, I think for me, before brain health, the last few years, I spent a lot of time in oncology, immunology, rare disease, and I really saw how the oncology space evolved from the beginnings of chemotherapeutics to monoclonal antibodies to precision medicine, etcetera. And that happened over the span of a couple decades. And now you start to see within oncology real precision approaches to treating oncology conditions. I think if we sort of forecast out, we forecast out and we take a look at the brain health area, what's exciting about brain science is we're on the, my personal opinion anyway, we're on the kind of, we're almost at the verge of that type of a transformation where over the next 10, 20, 30 years, you know, I believe through some of the science, through some of the approaches, through some of the data and technology, actually, we're going to develop a much more robust understanding of brain health conditions. And we're going to get to a point where we can really drive very precise impact. And if folks are thinking about joining companies that are part of the brain health industry, think about what your digital and analytical skills could do in a space like that, how much you could help and how much value you could create. So to me, it's almost, I saw that happen in oncology, and now it's, we look out over the horizon the next couple decades. I think there's a big opportunity to help a lot of patients with brain health conditions out there.

Steve Swan [00:31:40]:
You know, what's awesome is how much the utilization of it and technology has gone from, like we talked about at the beginning, they keep the lights on sort of mentality, you know, 1510 years ago to now you're at the front of the class, now you're, hey, can we do this? Can we crunch this? Can we figure this out? Yeah, we got this. You know, it's just awesome. And it's going to keep going, you know?

Matt Lasmanis [00:32:05]:
Yeah. And I think, you know, for me, what I'm excited about is driving strategic impact, but also shaping what that future looks like through the digital and technology tools, not just enabling it, actually going out there and saying, this could be different if we apply this thinking this way, you know? So that's what excites me every day.

Steve Swan [00:32:24]:
It's great stuff. It's great stuff. So. All right, cool. One last question before we go, and I alluded to this earlier when we spoke. So. I like music. I'm a music guy.

Matt Lasmanis [00:32:37]:
Yeah.

Steve Swan [00:32:37]:
If you had to say what your favorite live band was that you've ever seen in concert, what would that be?

Matt Lasmanis [00:32:45]:
Gotcha. You know? Yeah. You were waiting for this one. You know, I'm a big music guy. Yeah. Yeah. Wow, there's so many to choose. I tell you, I'll pick a pick.

Matt Lasmanis [00:32:55]:
Kind of a unique one.

Steve Swan [00:32:56]:
Okay.

Matt Lasmanis [00:32:56]:
So.

Steve Swan [00:32:56]:
Okay.

Matt Lasmanis [00:32:57]:
And it's actually kind of close to home. It's just something, you know, popping for me in the moment. I don't know. Do you know Brett Dennen by any chance?

Steve Swan [00:33:04]:
No.

Matt Lasmanis [00:33:05]:
He's like a sort of a folk artist, pretty relatively famous, but he's got, actually, he had a couple very large hits a number of years ago. But my kids really liked his work. Our family listens to it all the time, etcetera. And I'd say one of the shows I remember the most was a very, very small show. So not far. Not far from me in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, is a place called the Colonial Theater. It's an old theater. They keep it fixed up.

Matt Lasmanis [00:33:33]:
They just renovated aspects of it. And sometimes, if you're lucky, you can catch a really famous artist having a super small show there in the massive kind of movie theater hall that they have, which is an old school, very antique, beautiful, beautiful movie theater. And it just so happened a number of years ago, we caught it at the right time. Brett Dennen was having an XBN show there for one night, I think it was. We managed to get tickets. We were sitting right by the front row, and it was just the right artist in the right place at the right time. It was just a magical, magical performance. And my kids were still young, and they were listening to his music all the time, and so they were just loving every minute of it.

Matt Lasmanis [00:34:16]:
So, yeah, it's one of my most memorable shows, I'd say, and close.

Steve Swan [00:34:20]:
Yeah, it's great when you see, you know, something that you remember. It's just.

Matt Lasmanis [00:34:24]:
It's.

Steve Swan [00:34:24]:
It's, you know, I don't know. There's nothing like it, right. You know, you're getting the same experience as everybody in that same hall or that same venue, and it's just like, wow, that was fun. That was good, you know?

Matt Lasmanis [00:34:34]:
Yeah. And the venue. The venue is really, really special, very small scale venue, which is really cool.

Steve Swan [00:34:40]:
And it's like. It's like golfing. You try and go back and reproduce, but maybe you get there, but not quite right.

Matt Lasmanis [00:34:45]:
That's right.

Steve Swan [00:34:47]:
All right, well, listen, thank you very much for your time. I appreciate it. Anything else you want to add before we. Before we jump?

Matt Lasmanis [00:34:54]:
Thank you for inviting me. It's been a huge amount of fun. Always love having great conversations with you and. Yeah, just really appreciate it.