Bianca Anghelina
CEO, Aily Labs
In the end, it's about creating a culture of bringing teams together with different backgrounds and delivering on a mission that solves challenges together. I think that's what shapes the culture of a company and the diversity of organization.
Summary
This week, Alan was joined by a visionary startup founder, global business leader, and AI entrepreneur. Bianca Anghelina is the founder and CEO of Aily Labs, a company helping businesses to realize the power of AI in everyday tasks.
Bianca founded Aily Labs in 2020 after seeing firsthand – as a former pharmaceutical executive – the biggest challenges that global businesses face today in integrating AI across their operations. In their dynamic episode together, Alan and Bianca explore her journey to delivering the power of AI to large enterprise businesses around the world. Together, they take a deep dive into Bianca’s early life and upbringing in Romania, work with healthcare leader Novartis as the global head of digital finance, and the many lessons in leadership she has learned along the way to founding Aily Labs.
Mentions & Resources in this Episode
Guest Bio
Bianca Anghelina is the CEO and Founder of Aily Labs, the pioneer of an AI-powered decision intelligence app for global enterprises that’s helping thousands of decision-makers use business-driven applied AI to drive bottom-line growth. Bianca founded Aily Labs in 2020 with a mission to democratize AI and enable organizations to become AI-enabled companies at scale. Through the Aily Labs app, Bianca has built a scalable AI solution across industries and business functions that effectively turns huge volumes of complex, often siloed data into real-time personalized recommendations, subsequently boosting company productivity ten-fold and delivering growth throughout the value chain. She previously worked at pharmaceutical giant Novartis where she led Global Digital Finance and the company’s AI transformation.
Under Bianca’s leadership, Aily Labs has raised $21 million in a Series A round and scaled from three to 300+ employees in three years. Prior to its Series A round, Aily Labs was self-funded and has remained profitable since its first year operating. Bianca has been recognized as one of the top 50 CEOs to watch in 2024 by Pavilion, the premier global community for B2B go-to-market leaders.Bianca Anghelina is the CEO and Founder of Aily Labs, the pioneer of an AI-powered decision intelligence app for global enterprises that’s helping thousands of decision-makers use business-driven applied AI to drive bottom-line growth.
Bianca founded Aily Labs in 2020 with a mission to democratize AI and enable organizations to become AI-enabled companies at scale. Through the Aily Labs app, Bianca has built a scalable AI solution across industries and business functions that effectively turns huge volumes of complex, often siloed data into real-time personalized recommendations, subsequently boosting company productivity ten-fold and delivering growth throughout the value chain. She previously worked at pharmaceutical giant Novartis where she led Global Digital Finance and the company’s AI transformation.
Episode Transcript
Alan Fleischmann
I'm joined today by a visionary startup founder, global business leader and AI entrepreneur. Bianca Angelina is the founder and CEO of Aily, Aily Labs actually. A company helping businesses to realize the power of AI in everyday tasks. Bianca founded Aily Labs in 2020, after seeing firsthand as a former pharmaceutical executive, the biggest challenges that global businesses face today in integrating AI across their operations as the former Global Head of Digital Finance for Novartis, Bianca helped lead the Swiss pharmaceutical companies integration of AI. After seeing that year long data analytics, and other routine business tasks, and how it could be reduced to a day's work she founded Aily to deliver the power of AI to small and enterprise businesses around the world. I’m excited to have Bianca on the show today to discuss her fascinating background, her incredible journey, and the lessons in leadership she has learned along the way. Bianca, welcome to Leadership Matters. It's such a pleasure to have you on.
Bianca Anghelina
Hi, Alan, pleasure to be here with you today.
Alan Fleischmann
I'm very excited, been looking forward to this. Let's get started with a little bit on your early life and upbringing in Romania. Tell us a little bit about your life and what it was like growing up around your house. Tell us a little bit about your parents, any brothers or sisters? Anything else that was special about the community when you were growing up?
Bianca Anghelina
Oh, yes. So I'm originally from Romania. And I grew up in a small town in Transylvania called Sibiu. And I would say that childhood was special, you know, during Socialist times and post socialist times, we have to be creative in how, you know, to play those days. So I remember that together with my brother, we would actually create our own board games, you know, we would use papers and cartoons and different you know, glues really put together the Monopoly game as there was not much at that time in Romania. Now, my parents were working in the business area, my mother was a statistician at the time, and my father Mayer, and this probably shaped very early on, my passion for numbers. So one of my favorite games was actually to play “Doing Business”. I was pretty passionate about it, like looking at all the numbers reports of my mother and creating my own reports and trying to run my own business without actually knowing what running a business was at that time.
Alan Fleischmann
Love that. It has a little bit about the Sibley dynamics and things like that. Hasn't anyone around how big a family?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, I mean, in Romania we were, you know, a big family. In Romania, you have a lot of families split between town and countryside. And I used to spend the summers playing with my cousins and my brother, I have one brother and his friends. And yeah, I spend a lot of time in nature in the countryside. And as mentioned, you know, defining our own board games and exploring mostly nature at the time as we didn't have that much entertainment.
Alan Fleischmann
And when did you actually move from Romania to Germany? Was that when you were older or when you were still a kid?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah. So when I was 19, after graduating, I moved from Romania to Munich to study business administration in Munich.
Alan Fleischmann
So you have a lot of family still in Romania?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, my full family is in Romania, still living in Sibiu. And at that time, I was thinking, Oh, I just go for an experiment to study abroad. combine my passion for math and numbers with learning the language and I will come back reality is that I never came back. I continued my career in Germany, while now actually as part of Aily, we do have a digital hub in Romania. So I'm partly back. Not as my family was expecting at that time.
Alan Fleischmann
It gives you a good reason to go home or go home and see family as well which is nice. Exactly. And you're employing people which probably even more appreciate it. Let's dive in your education a little bit. What made you decide in high school your equivalent High School in Romania that you wanted to study music like other thing is that you have mentors, or are there people who said that you should you should go to Germany or go elsewhere for your university? I'm curious how that became a priority.
Bianca Anghelina
Yep. So I was attending a German school at that time. And I was very passionate about mathematics. And I knew that I wanted to study something around finance. In fact, in Romania, actually, most female, you know, talents go out into the finance area. I think 80% of bank directors in Romania are actually female led. So there was this tradition of finance, and female talents. So I knew that I wanted to pursue a career around Finance and Business Administration. But I also saw the power of knowing a language, and I had a feeling that if you go into the country where you can learn the language even better, and combine it ideally with studies, this would help me for my future career.
Alan Fleischmann
So you were fluent in German when you actually went to Germany?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, I mean, as you learn it at school, right? Fluent is probably exaggerated. But studying that in German, I guess my language became really fluent. And it was in a post revolution in Romania, we didn't have much access to Western Europe at the time. And I got inspired by some books, which we were receiving, describing universities in Germany, around the country. And initially, I was like, oh, wow, that sounds cool. Let me apply for some of these universities. And then as time went by, I got accepted from one university to the other. So it started to shape up that I might actually move to Germany. And I had the opportunity to get an internship in a German-Romanian company at the time, and they sponsored my first years of university. So I got to, you know, benefit from global businesses and Romanian German collaboration early, early on. And that helped me to move to Munich. And
Alan Fleischmann
you graduate to university degrees, and that was taking my two different university degrees.
Bianca Anghelina
Yes. So as I mentioned, as a young girl, I still wanted to not leave Romania and my roots. And probably I had a little bit of fear inside me that I might want to come back home. So I decided to study in parallel, both in Romania, where I specialized in finance and banking, and in Munich, where I specialized in Business Administration.
Alan Fleischmann
Did you graduate at the same time?
Bianca Anghelina
Yes, I graduated at the same time. So you can imagine my holidays were pretty intense between doing internships in Germany and flying back to Romania to do my exams.
Alan Fleischmann
This is before they had classes that were virtual. And this is before people, you know, would fly back and forth, like you were. And this is certainly before, in fact, it's quite rare in universities in Europe, that they have joint programs, and you didn't have a joint program, you actually created two very parallel experiences. Pretty amazing. Number one, that you took it on, that they weren't a joint program, number two, that you managed to do it without zoom, or you know, or the virtual platform, and that you had to go back and forth. That must have been really intense. Yeah,
Bianca Anghelina
exactly. It was pretty intense. Now that you mentioned it, I remember that. Early days, I would even go back by bus from Munich to Romania, like a 20 hour trip at that time, to have my exams. But yeah, I'm, I loved it, I felt that I'm learning something different, and I still keep the connection to Romania. And the studies were, in a sense, complimentary, because I could specialize more in finance and banking in Romania while learning something on top in Germany, and I didn't stop there, right. I was. I discovered in the early days that I really love interdisciplinary environments. So I also started a master's degree or an honours degree on technology management on top of my business administration study in Germany, which was run by the Technical University and Ludwig Maximilians, University Business University in Munich. And that's where I discovered my passion for technology and combining actual business with technology. Because we were put together in teams mixed up of business people, engineers, it graduates with a mission to to build products and then pitch in front of consultancies or VC funds.
Alan Fleischmann
Along the time that you were kind of directing towards what has become your life, passion, and your career. Were there, were there mentors, were there people who, you know that looking back, they played such an important role of encouraging you every sample?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, I think towards my studies, I had mentors in Boston University, but also privately. Funny enough, my kindergarten teacher moved from Romania, to Munich, and she was one of my first supporters to embrace a new culture. And she helped me to navigate in a completely new culture and Western Europe lifestyle, and I think that really helped me, you know, to adapt quicker to an environment and then later on to be able to navigate global environments.
Alan Fleischmann
Yeah, thank you. Great. This is great.
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, during university, I obviously had mentors as part of our technology management program. And at that time, already, young intrapreneurs, who went to Berkeley and us learned the dream of Silicon Valley, and we're coming back to Munich and teaching technology management. So I always looked up to them and found it very inspiring on how you can transform technology into something really impactful in a business environment.
Alan Fleischmann
And while you were there you studied in Munich at the Center for Digital Technology and Management. The program's motto is to empower innovators of tomorrow, which I would say perfectly describes your own entrepreneurship and trajectory. That's a little bit about your time with the center.
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah. So at the center, I actually bid for my very first product, which was posted with an RFID chip on it. Well, I think that was not the best application. We even patented at the time with Zimmerman's, but I guess the use case was not that powerful, because what it meant to be is that you can find a post on your door in the moment you want the person reaching the door to read it. Later on, I think we got RFID chips in the supply chain management in a much more powerful use than what we were thinking at the time. Still, I really enjoyed, you know, like creating something together as a team. And going all the way from how technology works into what is the use case. And pitching it to big corporations at a time Siemens as I mentioned. So that's something which really shaped my, I guess, my career later on. Now, I was still, you know, adapting to Munich. And I think I was, at that time, not brave enough to found my own company. I was still learning how to, you know, deal with a new culture. And yeah, many of my colleagues at the time, became innovators of the future and found it right after a while. I decided to go the more conservative way, in the very first step, but I came back.
Alan Fleischmann
Lazy, but tell us a little bit about that early career you started as a consultant with a firm called e.on Or is it E on how to do it? Yeah, it
Bianca Anghelina
was actually a small boutique consultancy company. Schubert investor of and they are A big client was eon Eon is one of the biggest energy companies in, in Germany. And I, while others were starting at Big consultancy companies, I chose to go with a boutique company because I thought I will get early on much more responsibility in a smaller firm, and that was a fact, actually, my very first day I was sent as kind of a senior consultant to Romania, to advise this big energy company on integrating an energy provider, which they bought in Romania to integrate it into the group structure. So, on the first day, I benefited from my language experience. I could navigate between the German management from Munich and the Romanian local management that already helped on day one. However, on day two, I realized that there is much more complexity than just knowing the language because I was in charge of the finance, financial transformation and embedding this new company into a corporate structure. So it was quite fun. I got a huge responsibility I was looking for from the very first days, I joined the consultancy company.
Alan Fleischmann
That's amazing. So you were, you know, then you went to Schubert and invested half were permanently after that, right?
Bianca Anghelina
So that was the boutique company who was basically the, like an in house consulting for eon, the energy company, got
Alan Fleischmann
it. And then And then obviously, again, it just seems like looking back at your trajectory, where you love and you're passionate, it all fits together. Same with your role with BMW, tell us a little bit about that. What attracted you to your role there, and the highlights even from a technological lens to things that you were exposed to that you were leaving there as well?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, so I've, what I've loved about consulting is, I guess, the spirit of everything is possible, I got to enjoy this very early on, and train my brain for structured solutions, and find solutions as fast as possible. And BMW is a dream employer, of course, in Germany. So I was excited to take on a new role. And I continued on my paths in finance. And at BMW, I was in charge of implementing a planning system at that time on SAP planning system, which was really structuring all the data and bringing consistency between country and the global enterprise. So yeah, in the early days, I was an SAP consultant. won't believe it. Now, some years later, but that helped me really to understand how actual systems work in these big organizations.
Alan Fleischmann
And then, and then from there, once again, were there mentors along the way that you're still in touch with people who actually influenced you as well. And the different places?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, I think it was funny, because I went a few weeks ago back to BMW, but in my new role providing AI solutions, I went back to the very same place where I was a consultant. So I still have connections to, you know, former employees who are working there, but I think the biggest mentor ship, I got more in and in my next roles, in, in Novartis, where I took over real business responsibility. And where I had the possibility to really own a P&I, because consultancy was amazing for building up the grid, I was just grid describing on getting solutions for any problem you get on the table. But I missed owning something, right? Owning my own department, and that's where my decision came to move on to Novartis where I got the opportunity to really manage a P&I early days, and you know, like being responsible for the results and not just implementation of a system.
Alan Fleischmann
And do you and was that a big decision to go with obviously, every decision is a big one. But had you known much about Novartis before?
Bianca Anghelina
No, I didn't. I didn't know much about life science and healthcare at that time, but I got intrigued by the, by the roll with they were offering which was called head of planning and modeling, which, yeah, as I think gave me this perspective on planning, the business and being involved in how Pharma is looking at business planning, and modeling different scenarios, and that was also the reality of the job, it was pretty close to, to the CEO, and the CFO. So it gave me a very quick perspective on how life science and healthcare works. So I guess my consultant's background helped me to adapt pretty fast. I was not scared about going into another industry.
Alan Fleischmann
And also, you were not scared to speak your mind and share your insights when you saw them. Because you've been doing that as a consultant, as you know, so you would know in many ways you were leading, innovating, and and probably advising, you know, some of the leadership as well, from the get go.
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, totally, I remember that already. In my first week, I came in with my consultant hat on and saw a lot of inefficiencies in the process, and proposed that we have to implement a new tool to make all of the data consolidation much, much simpler. So that was a very first step that probably looked a bit disruptive, but my team appreciated it along the way.
Alan Fleischmann
That's great. So tell us a little bit about how you managed and any moments where you, you know, insights, have you gathered that become traits of your leadership that continue today, Phase A, you started to develop in those early years in Novartis?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, so I was at the time a very young leader, and started in Novartis in a country organization, and I was leading a team of three to five people. Again, coming from the external world, I had to earn my presence and my existence as a leader. So I think, early on, I understood that having a vision is what brings the team along, and will create a bonding between me as the leader and the team. But the vision is not enough, right? If the vision also simplifies the way of working of the people, and they feel that things go better, smoother, then you really create a truly, you know, like, engaged organization. So that's something which I had to, you know, experiment as a young leader early on. And I really believed in that, from the very start, to connect with my team, and to show them the way and to show them why we can do things differently and why it benefits everyone.
Alan Fleischmann
And that content, obviously, it's continued till today. Tell us a little bit of the highlights of that journey, because you started the company trying to execute at Novartis as the head of business planning and analysis. But you pretty quickly became the Global Head of Financial Planning and Analysis. You were close to the CFO, as you mentioned. Tell us a little bit about that journey, as well.
Bianca Anghelina
Yes, sure. So I continue being curious to explore new parts of the organization. So I moved into the global role. And what I gained was going from a country perspective, right, Germany was a big country, but then on a global level, I got to see all the different countries and functions into a globe in a global organization. So I guess that next step really helped me in understanding how to navigate really different functions and different countries and also priorities I have in a global environment. So I think what, what what I basically gained in a global environment was, you know, this mighty, mighty business effect and how to connect different different players to achieve some of the, of the goals we had as as a company that was just bringing it to a completely different dimension, versus what I experienced on a country level.
Alan Fleischmann
With the whole time that you were there, and no rights, were you in Munich,
Bianca Anghelina
I was in Basel in Switzerland. And after two years, I actually came back to Munich to lead the finance department of the generics unit Sanders. So I was a bit back and forth between Basel and Munich. So the generics business helped me to see a different part of of healthcare, where it is a lot about cost efficiency, and how to produce medicine in a very, very efficient way, and how to, you know, like leverage, generics and biosimilar business for bringing medicine to do more, more affordable medicine to the market.
Alan Fleischmann
So in 2016, you left Novartis. Was that hard to do? You joined Sandoz, a global leader in generic and biosimilar medicines. What prompted that change? Tell us a little bit about that. Where were you based? Actually, when you did that, was that back in Basel? Or is that in Munich?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah. So that was exactly what I was sharing, just before sending us to a division of Novartis. So I was, okay, I was sent basically on a mission into the SR division, and then I returned back to Novartis.
Alan Fleischmann
So you still were part of Novartis, even when you were the head of global digital finance as well, that was when that was your next position and of ours. That's the one that I know. But I think if you, I think you'd be ahead of global digital finance and Novartis.
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, that was my last position. Exactly. So at Sandoz, you can imagine that while from a country to global Novartis, I've learned the dynamics between countries and global level. Sandoz gave me a completely new perspective of business more close to retail and fast moving consumer goods business.
So I think that was really a great, great experience. And at that time, there were the challenges of prices dropping, because of, you know, increased manufacturing in China, and India. So we had real challenges to keep the P&I in a sustainable in a sustainable way and protect our profits. So it was definitely a nice experience, to see how sometimes the P&I is very tough to manage when external events, unexpected external events happen. So after that, indeed, I went back to Novartis. And I was intrigued to go back, but I had the condition.
At that time, the CFO of the pharma division asked me to come back and I said, Well, I saw all the countries I saw globally, I saw the generic business unit, why should I come back to Basel there should be something really exciting. And what he promised me is really a carte blanche to create what I believe is the finance department of the future. So I, of course, jumped on it. Carte blanche sounds like a real adventure. And there's Yeah, convinced me to go back to Basel to enter the role of head global digital finance. I basically redefined even my title, from global business planning to really Digital finance because that was my mission to transform finance into digital finance.
Alan Fleischmann
How long were you at that position?
Bianca Anghelina
I was around two and a half years in that in that position, so it wasn't a real I'm on a real mission from from day one, on transforming both like the responsibilities of the team, but also technologies which, which we used. And I went into the role with the thinking of how we can get inspired by other industries, right? I saw that just moving to Sandoz, which was still pharma, but the generics division, I gained so much more experience on how to deal with different business events. So I had this idea to get inspired by how technology companies actually run their business. So that's where, early days when the AI was not that typed, I started to look into companies like Microsoft, right, and how they actually apply AI. And I got this external, Inside Out perspective on how AI can change the way of working. And at that time, I think technology companies were obviously more advanced in using AI than other industries.
Alan Fleischmann
Got it. I think that's cool. And then and then what made you when did you start thinking? I mean, you were really talking about AI and dealing with AI before anybody else was, and certainly, many were dealing with AI, but it wasn't, it certainly wasn't in mass at that point. So it was great gutsy to start thinking about your own company, tell us a little bit about how that started in the sense that, you know, what is there? And obviously was an entrepreneur, you who said I need to do this? Were there people that encouraged you? And what was it that you were seeing that actually led you to want to say that was the moment?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, so I'm, in a very first place, what I experienced with AI is disrupting my own role, right? I got inspired by how other companies use AI. But then I've implemented AI and changed my own role. So I think my personal experience on how I was dealing with data analytics really motivated me at the end of the day. And you might know, you know, how planning works in the enterprise, world, complex organization, like Novartis have, I don't know different countries, 50 countries, different regions, a global organization, and putting a plan together can take nine to 12 months, because the countries would submit a region, the region would submit to a global environment, and at the end of the day, the plan would still not be perfect. By implementing AI. I basically simplified this process into really, a matter of weeks, and we would get a much more realistic plan, which everybody can see, at the same time, and not after a couple of weeks and months. So seeing this life. And for my own role, I think it was the trigger inside me to say, Okay, finally, I found the technology, which can really make a difference out there, back to my passion to combine technology with business. So that's where in 2020, I decided to found Aily Labs.
Alan Fleischmann
And when you started Aily Labs were you employee number one? There was nobody who made it with you. How did that work?
Bianca Anghelina
Yes, indeed, I was “employee number one”. I found that I found it daily. And it was right in time when COVID Would COVID was starting right. I decided to leave my safe space in Switzerland and build my own company. And back to your question around mentors. One of my mentors, those days, encouraged me and said, well, moments of crisis are the best moments to find a company. And that's what I did. I go like, “Okay, that makes sense.” So, I spent some time thinking about what I want to achieve and back to my experience as a business leader, I realized that decision making is very cool. complex in organizations because of the structure of the organization's and how data is very siloed.
And that's pretty normal in big organizations, right? I see now like, even for us when we are growing, you just naturally start to put structure in place. So big organizations have functions, and everyone lives in their siloed function with different data. So I realized that where AI can make a difference is in connecting all the different functions, right and providing something which we as humans won't be able to connect, just because of the complexity and the amount of data out there. So that's how, at the very start, the vision was always to connect the data across the value chain of a company and apply AI to transform the data into real time insights. And that's what Aily Labs is now, about. We are the very first iOS decision intelligence platform, which combines data enterprise wide.
Alan Fleischmann
Tell us a little bit about the, for the listeners here, how would they? How would they get to know more about Aily Labs? And what would they connect to as well?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, so what is actually a decision intelligence app right? To start with, and because what I didn't want, right, I didn't want to just create a new tool. Right? Back in my days, we talked about my BMW experience, I was implementing SAP planning systems. Back in Novartis, I would look for other tools to simplify reporting. And now, I didn't want to just have yet another tune. So what decision intelligence is about is also about connecting people in an organization and creating a completely new way of working. Now, think about how we are actually being efficient in our private lives. Nowadays, we use apps for navigating our way through streets, we use Netflix recommendations to pick a movie, which we want to see. And that's what we want to achieve with a new way of working. We want to bring this experience which we are used to from private life to having very easy to use apps to continue this and bring this into the enterprise experience. So with Aily Labs, we put AI on the fingertips of any employee, without the need of knowing the technology of being a programmer itself.
Alan Fleischmann
That's really cool. So tell us a little bit about the journey of hiring talent. And finally, people who shared your mission at a time actually, you started this during COVID. So at a time when it was probably very hard to actually identify who you wanted to build this with. But tell us a little bit about that opportunity, that challenge. And then who you were looking for and what makes an Aily Labs culture, what is the bit that makes it so that the values that you want people to have and and how does that actually become part of a culture?
Bianca Anghelina
Yes, certainly. So yeah, we talk about the alien place as aliens. And meanwhile, we grew from, you know, those days, five employees to 300 employees today. So in a very first step, I brought on board my Co-Founder, Sara, who is a data scientist and brings AI expertise into the company. And I think we are the perfect combination of business and AI. And that's what we then also looked after in people we hired at Aily. And yeah, you're right, it was quite difficult in COVID times and insecure times to get people on board. But I think our vision of creating something truly exceptional and Apple of AI is a real product and got people excited, because it's like three and a half years ago, when AI was still in its early days. You would have data scientists working on a lot of projects, right?
And their results are the results of their work. They end up on PowerPoint slides and presentations, but not into a product. So I think what we saw very early is that, you know, people got intrigued and passionate about the opportunity to build a real product. And in fact, I think we are one of the few really AI native products, which, you know, like we didn't create a solution based on AI hype, but the heart of our solution is AI. So I think that's, that was the very, very first thing we got, right? We got the vision of creating a product, and something which didn't exist before. Right? And then that's where we managed to hire people who had similar passion around technology, but applied to concrete business needs.
Alan Fleischmann
And what do you think actually, this tells you when you're when you're talking to other CEOs or founders, about who are focused on the digital future and technology? What would you say are the number one qualities that you said we need to find and identify in future employees?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, I mean, we really have three clear values we are looking after. And I think that's what defines our aliens on board, which is agility, a real passion for innovation and always looking for what is the next big thing out there. And third, the third or third value is fun, enjoying really what, what we are creating, because building something completely new will always have challenges on not running smoothly or fast enough. And if you truly enjoy what you are building, then you will overcome any challenge out there. Now, I think in terms of employees of the future, AI will be a must. And understanding applied AI will be a key differentiator for leaders of the future. I think by now everybody knows that AI is – and will – transforming the way of working. But those who know how to apply it in an efficient way, will be the ones who will exceed in terms of performance, and maximize the value of the companies. And that's where Aily comes in. That's what we are exactly. That's what we want to help companies in creating really more value and accelerating, both growing. But also productivity.
Alan Fleischmann
You said you once mentioned that you see are described Aily Labs as the next Apple of AI, making it beautiful and easy to use. Were they really backwards? How is it that Aily Labs is making ambition a reality? Tell us a little bit about that?
Bianca Anghelina
Yes. So back to what I mentioned, I wanted to create a product which really puts AI in the hands of any employee. That's where everything started. So we have a mobile first mentality. And that is quite unique in the enterprise world, right in when when you talk about enterprise, you think about complex SAP system and XML files, but in purpose, in line with our vision of Apple of AI, we design with a mobile first mentality in in our mind, and why is that we believe that that in a very first place forces us to really think what is the information the users really, really need to take a decision.
And second, we know that we are using our mobile apps and our phones on a very, very regular basis, actually I think even 70 times per day. So that's the medium which we can use to also advance our business decision. Making it because imagine if you don't have to wait for governance boards, but you can actually take decisions by just looking at recommendations on your phone. So that's how we make it a reality. We design it with a mobile first mentality. And we make complex AI very simple. So our users don't have to, like, be confronted with dashboards full of numbers, but get reals or stories, which basically give them recommendations on, you know, watch out, for example, in a manufacturing site, because there are deviations into the process. And if you don't act, you might actually lose some sales on specific products out there.
Alan Fleischmann
I love that. And are there other things that you can share that are coming your way that we should actually look forward to the future tests a little bit the future looks like a little bit?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, so we are like, like you said, we are the creators of a completely new category with decision intelligence. And we are already unique in providing transfer transversal insights across the value chain of the company. And we will bring it to the next level, with, with all the AI advancements out there, and bringing our elite agent to life, that we don't only give transversal insights, but we would always provide scenarios for the different decisions one has to take to optimize the enterprise value. So yeah, we try to like, capture any new AI models or evolutions out there, and then put it into the perspective on how it can drive business impact.
Alan Fleischmann
So you've been very passionate about gender equity and technology and gender equity in AI. How do you believe we can encourage more women to enter the tech workforce? And, and close the current industry gender gap, which does exist?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, so obviously, it's not that easy to be female founders in the technology space. But I think both me and Sarah enjoy it pretty much because we see this as an opportunity to inspire women and young girls out there, and thinking about what the challenge is, I think it's back to maybe girls not being brave enough to take risks. And this reminds me of my own early days, right, I was also not brave from day one in taking risks. But at the end of the day, I think that we can show that everything is possible. And by leading the way, we hope we can inspire many, you know, young girls out there to do the same. We are also doing super days specifically for female data scientists to promote a career in AI and within our company. But we don't stop there. Right. I truly believe that in the end, it's about diverse teams, and creating this culture of, you know, bringing teams together with different backgrounds and delivering together on a mission solving challenges together. I think that's what in the end shapes the culture of a company and the diversity of organization.
Alan Fleischmann
I meant through diversity in general, not just gender, but obviously the idea of having a diverse approach to decisions: inventing, innovation, all the above.
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, I mean, we have I think, we have meanwhile, around 20 nationalities at a limb and I truly believe that is a boost of creativity and how we look at things differently, right? I think the mix of different cultures and profiles makes the project even more special. And that's why as a next step, we are expanding into the US and building up our go to market organization into us so that we continue actually to shape our culture and become a truly global organization.
Alan Fleischmann
Well tell us a little about your global aspirations as well. Because I know your market tell us a lot about where your market is and where you're going.
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, so I, my vision never, never changed, right to build the apple of AI and build something exceptional. And we are on the right track. I think the AI wave is just accelerating, actually, actually, this vision. So our goal is to democratize AI and help big companies out there. By using AI and simplifying the way of working. That's my big goal. If you ask me about the number, I'm dreaming about reaching 1 million employees out there using the Ailey app on their day to day work. And I think we are, we are pretty, pretty good on track. And we'll always try to be three steps ahead versus what other companies can achieve. And we had this head start of three years when we built the AI system in the background and connected all the different functions all over from R&D to commercial supply, and finance. And now we are building on top of this expertise.
Alan Fleischmann
Love that too. What advice would you give other entrepreneurs or potential entrepreneurs right now, about starting in this climate we're diving in? I mean, you've started to during COVID, which is not an easy time to begin, what would you say about you know, someone who's looking at you as a role model Bianca and saying, I want to jump in and do something, or should I jump in and do something right now?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, I think it's, it starts with the vision, and believing in your own vision is the starting point. And then it's all about people creating an exceptional team who believes and believes in that vision. And yeah, is, is willing to go an extra mile to make the vision a reality. And I think back to fears, and especially to female entrepreneurs out there. Be brave, you know, everything is possible. If you believe in it, and you dedicate time and passion to it, that's in the end, what fuels me every single, single day. I believe that what we do truly transforms the way of working in big organizations. And, you know, like I was reflecting the other day, that actually being the first and trying out something completely new, can be challenging, because there are a lot of unknowns, but we see it, it's also a huge benefit, right? Because we are not just riding the wave of AI, we are shaping the wave of applied AI for business with our app being the very first iOS decision intelligence platform out there. So there are a lot of rewards being the first and you know, like realizing that you build a real legacy for the generations to come. It's just taking the opportunity to make it happen.
Alan Fleischmann
I love that. And then I guess, what are the attributes you would say? If someone's trying to evaluate for themselves? Am I an entrepreneur? And should I do what Bianca does? What would you say those attributes need to be?
Bianca Anghelina
Well, I think you do need a lot of passion for what you are doing and energy and energy invested both in the product side but also leading. I do believe that and it fits obviously your motto. Liking to lead all the way is something which you need if you want to build not only an exceptional product but also an exceptional company.
Alan Fleischmann
That's right, what would you like to share? In our next couple of minutes? Before we have to wrap up? I knew that we needed more time with you. Bianca, what do you want to share a little bit about the future? And a little bit about your role as a leader? And what would you want our listeners to actually look for when they think about you as a founder or CEO going forward?
Bianca Anghelina
Yeah, I think we, we are in such acts, we we started to discuss about it when when we started, Ellen, it's such a great moment to be at the moment and AI transformation, it's one of the biggest transformations, we probably realize. And I would really encourage everyone to embrace and live the years of transformation, which are so transformational. And what we try to achieve is to help companies to rewire their organizations on how to make the best use of AI, and showing the way and on how it can actually really benefit and take any fears away because AI is here to stay. And to make us really better, I really see this as a huge opportunity to supercharge our, our competencies, right? Imagine that you have in the future, always the best decision advisor next to you, helping you to take decisions, of course, in a business environment. That's amazing, right, I would have wished to have many consultants and support early in my career. Now with AI, this is actually happening, and it's possible. And our mission at Aily is to not only make it possible, but make it very, very easy accessible. With a very simple, easy to use app from day one.
Alan Fleischmann
Well, it's very exciting, I would say what you're doing and what you're innovating, what you're creating is not like anybody else out there. So it's really exciting to watch. It's exciting to see how you're able to scale AI for use, and to take away the fear or the uncertainty in it by being you know, by offering something that actually is complex and complicated, and its invention, but simple and understandable and its use. So it's been really a pleasure.
You've been listening to leadership matters. I'm your host, Alan Fleischmann. And we've just spent the last hour with Bianca Anghelina, founder and CEO of Aily Labs. It was such a pleasure to have you on today. You had such a fascinating journey from Romania to Germany, actually with a couple of stops in between Switzerland. And now going global, I guess I'll see more as a global citizen going forward. But as the founder and CEO, you've shared a lot here and it just sounds like the best is yet to come. So looking forward to seeing those great new heights that you will take the company to next and hopefully having you back on the show in the future as well.
Bianca Anghelina
Thank you so much and it was a real pleasure. You brought me back in time and into the future. So I really enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to being back.
Alan Fleischmann
Thank you, looking forward to the next thanks so much. Talk to you soon. Thank you