What transformation is Agilent Technologies undergoing?

The biggest shift our approach to strategy. We looked at our markets in aggregate, asking where the opportunities were. That led us to four major areas: portfolio expansion and innovation, identifying high-growth segments, enhancing lab productivity, and building out software and informatics capabilities. These are critical to every market we serve—pharma, biopharma, applied markets, and diagnostics.

Four main things are enablers of our strategy. First is our unified commercial organization. We brought together sales, services and marketing under one global structure. Second is our digital ecosystem. We have invested heavily to make it easier to do business with us and to reach more customers. Third, and the biggest change in 25 years, is our IGNITE transformation. IGNITE is built around growth. We are fostering a strong leadership team and a unique, customer-focused culture across the company. What is the company’s approach to innovation?

Innovation is foundational to growth. We are seeing strong adoption of our new LC platform, Infinity Tree, which boosts lab productivity by 10–20%. We are also collaborating with ABB Robotics to build automated lab solutions. We are shifting our R&D strategy—aggregating product lines and making asymmetric investments in the highest-growth areas.

Customers are buying the whole productivity solution. The Infinity Lab Assist Automation Software and OpenLab CDS are all part of that. Through IGNITE, we are accelerating how we bring new capabilities to market. What role does biopharma play in Agilent’s overall strategy?

The demand for new therapeutics continues to grow. Within our customers, R&D spend is increasing. We are embedded in this space through our analytical platforms—supporting R&D, development, and QA/QC for biologics. Our oligonucleotide manufacturing business in Colorado is a world leader; we invested US$750 million and see strong uptake in clinical and commercial batches. Customers asked for more capabilities, leading to our US$1 billion acquisition of BIOVECTRA, which brings microbial fermentation, peptide precursors, ADCs, and sterile fill-finish capabilities. We are not aiming to be a generalist CDMO. We are building a specialized, high-capability business in strategic swim lanes. What emerging areas are you most excited about?

There is incredible innovation happening in therapeutics. Cell and gene therapy remains a huge area of focus. Large molecule development is accelerating. We are also looking at proteomics and spatial biology as areas of future growth. How is artificial intelligence (AI) leveraged to drive the company forward?

Internally, we use AI to drive efficiency. Two of our manufacturing sites won World Economic Forum Global Lighthouse Awards. We are using AI in modeling, planning, and integrating robotics with the human workforce, helping us create more knowledge-based roles and upskill our employees. Externally, we apply AI to improve customer experience and asset performance. Our acquisition of SixSense helps customers monitor the effectiveness of their installed base and enables predictive maintenance. The key is focus—not having too many AI projects but choosing use cases with clear impact. How does Agilent help customers with sustainability goals?

Sustainability is a business differentiator. Customers want partners who can help them meet sustainability objectives. That starts with our products—how they are designed, the solvents we use, and their environmental impact. Programs like the ACT label help communicate that. We have standardized our sustainability approach across the portfolio. What is Agilent’s long-term approach to this ever-changing market?

Pharma is a fast-moving, innovation-driven space. There is incredible science coming out of pharma and biotech, and Agilent is there to help scientists get to outcomes quicker and more productively. We have a global team of technical experts who work side-by-side with customers in the field every day, helping with methodologies and speeding up results. Pharma has a long runway, and we are investing to stay ahead of it.

We keep a long view. There is a lot changing in the world, but we do not want to overreact to daily headlines. We are staying focused on executing IGNITE and maintaining a sharp customer-first mindset. We have large M&A ambitions. BIOVECTRA is just the beginning. We are looking across all our strategic swim lanes for opportunities to add new capabilities. It is a time of positive, high ambition change at Agilent.