Adriana Rubio, CEO of Roche Diagnostics Spain, at Esade Matins: “Innovation is crucial for keeping people healthy”
“Innovation is essential for keeping people healthy. It leads to greater efficiency, lower costs and shorter treatment times; it facilitates access to healthcare by providing services in remote areas; and it improves health outcomes by enabling more effective, personalized treatments,” explained Adriana Rubio, president and CEO of Roche Diagnostics Spain, during her speech at Esade Matins, at the session entitled “Innovation in diagnosis at the service of people.” Rubio underlined that in order for innovation to be effective, it is essential to have a preventive mindset, plus infrastructures that ensure the availability of data and diagnoses, and an open collaboration ecosystem. “All this,” she added, “must be underpinned by robust science, ethical principles and strict regulatory compliance.”
Commitment to investment in R&D
“Roche Diagnostics invests in R&D today to continue making a difference tomorrow. In 2023, we spent 13.2 billion Swiss francs on this around the globe, making us one of the largest investors in R&D in the health sector,” highlighted the president and CEO of Roche Diagnostics Spain, also saying that “In Spain we have more than 2,500 employees in Madrid and Sant Cugat (Barcelona) and we invest more than €500 million in innovation each year.” She also emphasized the key role of Catalonia, “one of the main scientific hubs in the EU”, and compared it to countries such as Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Ireland, Belgium and Austria in terms of funding in this sector.
Future challenges: managing chronic disease
As regards the future of healthcare, Rubio warned that “the pressure on the system will increase as chronic diseases increase and healthcare is decentralized.” Likewise, she pointed out that “the average cost of medical care has grown faster than GDP over the last 20 years.” She expects outpatient care to increase in the next ten years, and believes that the main challenges will be in the area of chronic disease management, “There’s a need to prevent and an opportunity to manage chronic disease, thereby enabling a reduction in healthcare expenditure.”
Esade Matins are forums where the heads of companies and institutions can discuss their own challenges and goals, and share their careers in them. On this occasion, Adriana Rubio, president and CEO of Roche Diagnostics Spain, was joined by Manel Peiró, professor in the Esade Department of People Management and Organization, director of the Executive Master in Healthcare Organization Management, and director of the Esade Institute for Healthcare Management, and Patricia Valentí, director of Esade Alumni.
