For Verily, it’s been a year of connecting the dots.
The eight-year-old company got its start as Alphabet’s life sciences arm and, over the years, has launched numerous products and projects. In January 2023, Verily brought in former president Stephen Gillett as CEO, making changes to its leadership team and conducting layoffs.
The changes that went into effect in January and are aimed at streamlining Verily’s strategy, products, and organizational and operating models, Gillett told Endpoints News on the sidelines of the HLTH conference in Las Vegas. The goal is to make Verily a more commercial-focused organization.
“This has been the year of executing our plan,” Gillett said.
Chapter 1 was four to five years of R&D, as Verily tested out big ideas. Verily’s second chapter was the Covid-19 pandemic, as it leaned into testing and working with other companies looking to keep their employees safe during the pandemic.
“Now we are in Chapter 3,” Gillett said.
In addition to streamlining its organizational structure, Verily’s plan is to focus on three areas: Research (the work it does around clinical trials), care (tools like a retinal camera that can be used in primary care offices), and health financing (its insurance business).
Amy Abernethy, president of product development and chief medical officer at Verily, is tasked with making all of that work together.
“If you’re going to build towards improving precision health, we believe we need to build towards having a data and technology bridge between research and care,” and how that might come together with how healthcare is paid for, Abernethy said.
That means a common technical platform, Abernethy said. “2023 became the year where we really turned that corner to now replatforming on the back end, in preparation for how things fit together.”
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