October, 2017    SMM-168

Breathing Data

Amidst announcements and industry gossip about how companies such as Apple and Google are planning to upend the life science industry by their use of data, Novartis’s new CEO designate, Vas Narasimham, stressed the use of AI and data to revolutionise research and development productivity. This has strong parallels with evolutionary biology and, as reader’s of my work will know, it confirms what I’ve been predicting: in a world where data is pervasive, learning to use data at scale and in an integrated, bidirectional manner is essential for survival.