Eli Lilly CEO says he has ‘at least 1 or 2 AIs running’ during every meeting he’s in
In a recent episode of the “Cheeky Pint” podcast, Eli Lilly CEO David Ricks shared insights into how artificial intelligence (AI) has transformed his approach to staying informed about the latest developments in science and medicine. Ricks, who actively engages with medical journals and conferences, revealed that he utilizes AI tools during every meeting he attends, employing them to ask science-related questions. However, he expressed a preference for AI models like Anthropic’s Claude and xAI’s Grok over OpenAI’s ChatGPT, citing ChatGPT’s verbosity as a drawback. Ricks appreciates the terseness and reliability of the references provided by Claude and Grok, although he remains cautious about the potential for hallucinations—an issue that continues to challenge AI developers.
Ricks is not alone in his embrace of AI; other notable CEOs, such as Microsoft’s Satya Nadella and Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, have also highlighted how AI enhances their productivity and decision-making. Under Ricks’ leadership, Eli Lilly has seen a remarkable surge in stock value, primarily driven by the success of its GLP-1 weight-loss drug, Zepbound, and diabetes treatment, Mounjaro. Despite the promising applications of AI in various sectors, Ricks emphasized the limitations of current AI capabilities in drug development, arguing that a more comprehensive understanding of human biology is essential for AI to significantly contribute to the field. He suggested that achieving this understanding would require substantial investment in robotics and continuous experimentation to generate the necessary training data for AI systems.
Ricks’ comments underscore a pivotal moment in the intersection of AI and healthcare, highlighting both the potential benefits and the challenges that lie ahead. As the industry navigates these complexities, the call for enhanced research and investment in biological knowledge could pave the way for more effective AI applications in drug development. With leaders like Ricks advocating for a strategic approach to AI integration, the future of medicine may well be shaped by the advancements in both technology and our understanding of biology.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FmVCDx_kFw
Eli Lilly CEO David Ricks
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images
Eli Lilly CEO David Ricks says AI helps him stay up to date on the latest science.
Ricks said OpenAI’s ChatGPT is “too verbal” for those types of queries.
He wants something that is “more terse” and more reliable with its references.
Eli Lilly
CEO David Ricks says he uses AI in every meeting he attends.
“I read a lot of medical journals. I go to conferences where data is presented,” Ricks told Stripe cofounder John Collison during a recent episode of Collison’s “Cheeky Pint” podcast. “I spend time with our scientists to stay curious. Yeah, now I have at least one or two AIs running every minute of every meeting I’m in, and I just am asking science questions.”
Ricks said he doesn’t like OpenAI’s
ChatGPT
for science-related questions — “It’s too verbal,” he said. Instead, he prefers Anthropic’s Claude and xAI’s Grok. Still, he has to be careful to watch for halcunications, an issue the frontier model companies are still trying to tamp down.
“I find it more terse and the references actually check out more often,” he said. “Sometimes the AIs produce references, and they’re actually not the thing that it said, and that takes too much work to go cross-reference.”
xAI CEO
Elon Musk
quickly took notice of the praise.
“Cool that David Ricks uses @Grok as his daily AI advisor,” Musk wrote on X.
Ricks is just the latest big-name
CEO to reveal his AI diet
. Microsoft’s Satya Nadella said he uses Copilot to summarize his Outlook and Teams messages after reaching Microsoft’s Washington headquarters. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said he uses AI as a tutor.
Lily has been on a tear this past year, with shares up roughly 31%. The drugmaker has capitalized on sales of its
GLP-1 weight-loss drug
Zepbound and diabetes treatment Mounjaro.
AI still has a way to go when it comes to helping drug development, Ricks said.
“Probably we need to create the equivalent of what got created with human language, which is a more complete repository of biological knowledge to train against before the machines get a lot better,” he said. “And today, I don’t know, I would estimate we might know 10 to 15% of human biology, so the machine is not going to be good at all until we get way above 50%.”
To even reach that point, Ricks said there would need to be a significant investment in robotics to create the training data needed to teach AI.
“That probably requires robotic 24/7 experiments just to create training data sets and this kind of big lift effort, the kind of thing actually NIH should be doing right now, I would think,” he said. “But that effort’s not ongoing, at least in our country.”
Read the original article on
Business Insider
