DR. AJIT SHETTY
FORMER CHAIRMAN, JANSSEN BEERSE
My name is Dr. Ajit Shetty and I served as Chairman of Janssen Beerse from 2002 to 2012. I was very fortunate to have been part of Janssen under the leadership of Dr. Paul Janssen. We were the most productive pharmaceutical research lab in the world, bringing out two major new drug products a year from our highly innovative and productive R&D… a unique record in that period! Innovation was clearly the lifeblood of our company, and it was the DNA of the Janssen culture.
“WHAT’S NEW” was the slogan of Dr. Janssen when he met you and it set the tone for everyone at the company. Innovation depends on people and setting the right tone at the top was critical to motivate every individual. Innovation extended from R&D to marketing to finance as well as to the supply chain covering all aspects of the company. Value was created in every area…
Already at the end of last century we embraced ‘convergent technologies’ as impacting our industry. Today, as a Trustee of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, USA (a shared no.1 position in artificial intelligence), I can see these new technologies affecting every segment of the life sciences industry. An OPEN MIND is a critical fertile ground to permeate the seeds of innovation and we should encourage the younger generation along these lines.
The innovation process encounters obstacles along the way but we should encourage people to pick themselves up and find new solutions to circumvent these obstacles. The saying “DO NOT BE AFRAID TO FAIL” is well known and practiced in all major innovative institutions.
With these personal thoughts, I wish the audience a great journey through the Field of Innovation to a ‘Better World’ tomorrow for all of humanity…
