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Speaker 2: This is Bloomberg Business Week inside from the reporters and
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Speaker 2: Business Week with Carol Messer and Tim Steneviek on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: All right, everybody, you are listening to Bloomberg Business Week.
Speaker 1: I'm Carol Master, along as Stephen Carroll in for Tim
Speaker 1: Stenovik this week Stephen of Porus, host of Bloomberg day
Speaker 1: Break Europe. But really nice to have you here in
Speaker 1: New York. And I'm just curious do you talk about
Speaker 1: AI as much as we do?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's everywhere it is, right, And I mean, look,
Speaker 4: it's also the question of every person that has a
Speaker 4: new idea or a new use for it makes you
Speaker 4: start to think, then, well, what part of our lives
Speaker 4: are not going to be touched by AI?
Speaker 1: Well, I love it when people say that AI is
Speaker 1: going to be a long time before like we really
Speaker 1: get impacted in terms of society, because I just I'm
Speaker 1: waiting for the AI anchors broadcast. It's going to happen.
Speaker 1: It's going to happen. But it's also it sounds like
Speaker 1: coming for lawyers.
Speaker 4: Yeah if well, look for many it's already arrived. The
Speaker 4: legal industry is one that can see multiple consequences from
Speaker 4: the arrival of AI. So in one way, first of all,
Speaker 4: it's an extremely legally complex field. So the arrival of
Speaker 4: AI and to a lot of industry is going to
Speaker 4: create a lot of work for lawyers. But there are
Speaker 4: other huge opportunities to revolutionize the way in which a
Speaker 4: sector which you know sometimes has been thought about being
Speaker 4: a bit old fashioned, could change, and could change pretty dramatically.
Speaker 5: So talk about this. We've got Eleanor Lightbody with us.
Speaker 4: She's CEO at Luminance, which has developed a legal large
Speaker 4: language model and recently raised forty million dollars as it
Speaker 4: expands into the Dallas market. Alan, are great to have
Speaker 4: you with us on the program today. Can you, first
Speaker 4: of all, just explain to us how does your technology work?
Speaker 4: Is this lawyer GPT?
Speaker 6: Not quite so. Look as I'm sitting here in New
Speaker 6: York at the moment, and I'm looking outside a window,
Speaker 6: and there are people in every building, pretty much in
Speaker 6: every corner of this world who are receiving contracts, they're
Speaker 6: reviewing them, they're processing them, and they're deciding what to
Speaker 6: do with them. As that stands, it's very time consuming,
Speaker 6: it's very manual, it's very expensive, and it can introduce
Speaker 6: a lot of risk. And so what Luminance is doing
Speaker 6: is that we're automating a lot of those low level
Speaker 6: tasks that pretty much every business is faced with on
Speaker 6: a daily basis. But it's much border than it's much
Speaker 6: more specific than just a chat GBT rapper. I think
Speaker 6: that's really really important. We've built a proprietary, purpose built
Speaker 6: large language model that was only trained on legal contracts,
Speaker 6: and that's really really key because if you were using
Speaker 6: something like chat GPT to dress problems in legal I
Speaker 6: suppose because it's been trained across the whole Internet. I mean,
Speaker 6: it's amazing, isn't it like creating a contract or writing
Speaker 6: a poem for you? But fundamentally, it's been trained to
Speaker 6: give you an answer at all costs. And when you're
Speaker 6: working in the legal environment, you need an AI that
Speaker 6: knows when to hand back the answer to the human
Speaker 6: and knows when it doesn't know the answer. And that's
Speaker 6: really what sets us apart.
Speaker 1: I'm curious hasn't been put to work yet.
Speaker 6: Yes, absolutely, tell us how it's.
Speaker 1: Working out and any snags or problems, and how you
Speaker 1: continue to tweak it. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Absolutely so.
Speaker 6: Look, we have over seven hundred customers now around the
Speaker 6: world and in the US alone. In the last eighteen months,
Speaker 6: our US customers have increased by two hundred and twenty
Speaker 6: five percent, with the likes of AMD all the way
Speaker 6: through to Panda Express and Hitachi all using US. And
Speaker 6: I think fundamentally, how are business using US and why
Speaker 6: business is using AI for legal Well, they're all faced
Speaker 6: with the same problem. They're all faced with exploding in
Speaker 6: boxes they're trying to get through, they're all faced with
Speaker 6: increasing regulations, they're all faced with having to answer business
Speaker 6: questions on a second by second basis. So they're looking
Speaker 6: at AI to help them automate and augment that pretty
Speaker 6: much end to end. And what does that look like
Speaker 6: in practice, Well, that's I suppose being used for the
Speaker 6: creation of contracts. AI being used to help accelerate the
Speaker 6: process in negotiating contracts. So instantaneously, if someone receives a
Speaker 6: contract with our AI, they can press a button and
Speaker 6: the AI will tell them what clauses they can agree
Speaker 6: to which ones they can't, what the risk is, and
Speaker 6: what language they should use instead, and then AI being
Speaker 6: able to answer any business questions of all of their contracts,
Speaker 6: which a great example would be Yokogawa used to spend
Speaker 6: about seven days answering business questions. That's now reduced down
Speaker 6: to fifteen minutes at a maximum. So really, that end
Speaker 6: in nature is how businesses of all different sizes are
Speaker 6: really using the AI. You asked, what are some of
Speaker 6: the limitations? Will look at the moment, the way that
Speaker 6: the AI is being built, it's really to automate those
Speaker 6: low value, repetitive tasks. It's not to do the complex reasoning,
Speaker 6: and it's not to do the complex advice. But fundamentally,
Speaker 6: if you can free up people's time so that they've
Speaker 6: got more space to focus on that, then that's absolutely amazing.
Speaker 4: I'm wondering, are there areas of law which lend themselves
Speaker 4: to using your technology with the clients that you're working with,
Speaker 4: you find there's specific sectors where this really works well,
Speaker 4: or perhaps others where there's still development to be done
Speaker 4: before it can be before it can be applied.
Speaker 6: I think this is like it's a universal, it's kind
Speaker 6: of reaching companies universally in the sense that most companies
Speaker 6: in the world are having to review very similar contracts.
Speaker 6: Let's think about your NDAs, your sales agreements, your DPAs,
Speaker 6: and fundamentally all of those, all those companies want to
Speaker 6: accelerate the work that they're doing with those contracts. They
Speaker 6: want to get through them faster so they can really
Speaker 6: focus on other things. And so that's really where AI
Speaker 6: can help businesses. That and the fact that it can
Speaker 6: really highlight key business obligations of what you've agreed to
Speaker 6: in the past, identify key information instantaneously. That's really what
Speaker 6: I think is super powerful. If you're using AI to
Speaker 6: help you negotiate your multimillion pound deal, you might use
Speaker 6: it to help you summarize the key information in that contract,
Speaker 6: but you're probably going to want to spend more time
Speaker 6: on it than just you know, relying on it to
Speaker 6: do all of the work.
Speaker 1: I'm curious, your company started in a Cambridge dorm room
Speaker 1: back in twenty fifteen, so that's almost ten years ago.
Speaker 1: So you guys were doing this sort of thing way
Speaker 1: before we all started talking about large language models, right
Speaker 1: and generator of AI. So help us understand kind of
Speaker 1: what you were doing. How the last year and a
Speaker 1: half in terms of a whole different level of AI
Speaker 1: has maybe changed the game, if at all, or impacted you.
Speaker 6: Yeah, so it's I mean, it's been unbelievably exciting over
Speaker 6: the last two years. You know, our Aarsgreen five X,
Speaker 6: and I think let's cast our minds back to twenty
Speaker 6: fifteen when Adam and Graham had the founder started the business.
Speaker 6: They started it in the Innovation Park at the University
Speaker 6: of Cambridge, and they started it because they had noticed
Speaker 6: that a lot of their friends were lawyers and they
Speaker 6: were commenting on the hours that were being put in
Speaker 6: and sunk into very similar work, and Adam and Graham
Speaker 6: were like, look, AIS getting change the way in which
Speaker 6: humans interact with data and with content. I think we
Speaker 6: should build something for this. And really they sold first
Speaker 6: to law firms because they wanted to get data, because
Speaker 6: they knew that any AI company that was addressing this problem,
Speaker 6: data was absolutely key. And so they spent years working
Speaker 6: with the law firms and then they kind of moved
Speaker 6: into the in house legal teams because fundamentally they realized
Speaker 6: that the AI worked across all different industries, so it hasn't.
Speaker 6: I suppose we've been doing AI before it was cool
Speaker 6: and the changes and the developments in the models is
Speaker 6: great because you can combine them with some of the
Speaker 6: other forms of working and selling down a contract. And
Speaker 6: so the combination of what we call an analytics AI
Speaker 6: and then genitive AI really allows us to set ourselves
Speaker 6: apart in this market.
Speaker 4: I wonder how what your view is on how lawyers
Speaker 4: need to be trained differently to be able to take
Speaker 4: advantage of having your tools as well. People invest a
Speaker 4: lot of money and going to law school, especially in
Speaker 4: this country, and I wonder does it need to be
Speaker 4: overhauled to fit into an AI world.
Speaker 6: Well, I think most people spent a lot of money
Speaker 6: or spend a lot of money going into law school
Speaker 6: not to review and not to review very similar contracts
Speaker 6: to the junior lawyers right exactly. They've probably quite pleased
Speaker 6: that the AI can help them with that and get
Speaker 6: that off of their desk. I think, look, what we're
Speaker 6: seeing is AI is being used really to help them
Speaker 6: accelerate their training. So a lot of our companies will
Speaker 6: use it so that their paralegals or their first year's
Speaker 6: associates can get access and insights into how other people
Speaker 6: within the organization have negotiated different contracts. It's fantastic at
Speaker 6: retaining institutional knowledge. So I think that that's what we're
Speaker 6: going to start to see more of. Is that, whether
Speaker 6: that's you know, in the classroom or whether that's in
Speaker 6: real life, people will start adopting AI to help accelerate,
Speaker 6: whether it's their work or whether it's their knowledge, because
Speaker 6: really that's key to the success of their profession.
Speaker 1: Makes me wonder too if it cuts in on those
Speaker 1: hourly you know costs that lawyers charge because it's like, hey,
Speaker 1: I just you know, through it in the ai'm are more.
Speaker 5: High value work.
Speaker 4: I think is the part of it as well. Be
Speaker 4: interesting as well, and are great to talk to you.
Speaker 4: Thanks for joining us and their lightbody there CEO at
Speaker 4: Luminance joining us as discussing legal large language models.
Speaker 5: Not lawyer GPT. No, that's what we learned that yet.
Speaker 2: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Tim
Speaker 2: Stenebek on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 4: We'll continue our coverage of Climate Week in New York.
Speaker 4: We've got that and the un Chaneral Assembly happening as well.
Speaker 4: But we're thinking about some of the businesses that are
Speaker 4: using new technology in ways which help the planet. This
Speaker 4: ahead of our big broadcasts we have tomorrow as well,
Speaker 4: their Chat Innovation Price Summit happening in the Plaza Hotel
Speaker 4: here in New York, and we'll be there thinking about
Speaker 4: some of those innovation and solutions that can help in
Speaker 4: the climate world too. So we want to talk about
Speaker 4: one company operating in this space. Archive uses its tech
Speaker 4: tech to help big fashion brands launch their own resale sites.
Speaker 4: They're working with the lights of Doctor Martin's North Face
Speaker 4: and Oscar Dela Reenta. Emily Gittins is with us. She's
Speaker 4: co founder and CEO of Archive, and she joins us
Speaker 4: from Berkeley in California. Emily, great to have you with
Speaker 4: us on the program. Why do brands want to be
Speaker 4: associated with second hand versions of their clothes? This is
Speaker 4: something that I've been trying to get my head around
Speaker 4: when trying to understand. I know it's a big thing.
Speaker 4: I know people use websites to resell clothes all the time,
Speaker 4: but getting the brands involved is a really interesting development.
Speaker 7: Absolutely, yeah, thanks thanks for having me on the show.
Speaker 8: So you know, this is a huge market already, the
Speaker 8: global secondhand market is a two hundred and thirty billion
Speaker 8: dollar market today and for gen Z, forty percent of
Speaker 8: their clothing is secondhand. And so brands are realizing that
Speaker 8: there is this huge market for their product that is
Speaker 8: happening today mostly on third party marketplaces, and they're really
Speaker 8: interested in owning not only that customer experience, but also
Speaker 8: that revenue stream and helping shift to a more sustainable
Speaker 8: business model as well.
Speaker 7: And so there's some of the reasons that brands are
Speaker 7: getting involved.
Speaker 1: So explain that relationship working with them and what is
Speaker 1: kind of the business model, the profitability for you guys,
Speaker 1: also what they get out of it.
Speaker 8: Absolutely, Yeah, So how this works is we build software
Speaker 8: and tools that allow brands to launch a resale business
Speaker 8: and then grow it to be you know, a significant
Speaker 8: portion of their overall business.
Speaker 7: So that means you could go on to the north
Speaker 7: face dot.
Speaker 8: Com north Faces e commerce site and actually buy secondhand
Speaker 8: products through the brand facilitated through our software.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 8: For brands, originally this was really for a sustainability reasons
Speaker 8: that they were getting into this, trying to reduce their
Speaker 8: overall footprint by encouraging more secondhand shopping and less new production.
Speaker 8: What they've learned is that actually this is just a
Speaker 8: totally new revenue stream for them, and the margin on
Speaker 8: that that revenue stream can be quite high, sometimes even
Speaker 8: higher than on full price business. And so really they're
Speaker 8: thinking about it as a business case and a new
Speaker 8: growth part of their business that is very fast, fast
Speaker 8: growing and profitable.
Speaker 1: So you guys are business to business correct.
Speaker 7: That's right.
Speaker 8: Yeah, we're the behind the scenes software provider that is
Speaker 8: facilitating the software for brands to launch their own reselle
Speaker 8: business and brands can brand that however they want. So
Speaker 8: we have you know, New Balance, Reconsidered or north Face Renewed,
Speaker 8: Dot Marketings REWAAR just some examples of the brands we're
Speaker 8: working with today.
Speaker 4: I wonder is it how the conversation goes with some
Speaker 4: of the brands though, because if we're thinking about, you know,
Speaker 4: the Oscar dell Aronas of this world is the prestige brand?
Speaker 4: Is that a very different conversation you're having at them
Speaker 4: when you're saying, look, I know that everything you make
Speaker 4: is unique and amazing and brilliant, but there's also a
Speaker 4: market for it to be resold.
Speaker 7: That's right.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 8: I think with the luxury sector, this is much more
Speaker 8: about highlighting the history, the heritage, the vintage pieces of
Speaker 8: their brand and owning that customer experience that customers are
Speaker 8: too often today having in maybe thrift shot stores or
Speaker 8: vintage stores, but not directly through the brand. It's a
Speaker 8: little bit of a different conversation for the more mass brands,
Speaker 8: that's part of it.
Speaker 7: You know.
Speaker 8: Sometimes we'll auction off really interesting North Faced products from
Speaker 8: collections from long ago, but it's also a new acquisition
Speaker 8: channel for them, right. You know, for a lot of
Speaker 8: these brands, people are priced out of full price product
Speaker 8: and maybe buying lower quality items from a different brand.
Speaker 8: Being able to give them this discounted product in a
Speaker 8: way that you know, still represents the quality and the
Speaker 8: excitement around the brand is a really powerful reason for
Speaker 8: them to do it as well.
Speaker 1: Emily, I'm wondering if the brands that you guys are
Speaker 1: working with, as you mentioned Oscar, Jala, Renta, Dak, Martin's
Speaker 1: North Face, are they realizing too that the resale customer
Speaker 1: is different from the customer who buys things that are
Speaker 1: brand new.
Speaker 7: That's exactly right.
Speaker 8: Yeah, So over fifty percent of the customers who are
Speaker 8: shopping resale through our brands brand partners are completely new
Speaker 8: to the brand.
Speaker 7: And have never shopped with them before.
Speaker 8: So it's really reaching that person that is priced out
Speaker 8: of full price product and bring them into the brand,
Speaker 8: you know, having them fall in love with the product
Speaker 8: and then over time stay within that ecosystem for the
Speaker 8: brand and even for the customers that are already brand customers,
Speaker 8: they generally see a higher lifetime value for that cohort.
Speaker 7: So people are.
Speaker 8: More excited about the brand when they have this resell option.
Speaker 8: They know they can resell full price product if it
Speaker 8: doesn't work out, and so they're shopping across new and
Speaker 8: used with higher lifetime value as well.
Speaker 4: Is it a generational story as well? You know, is
Speaker 4: it gen Z being influenced by thrifting brands on TikTok
Speaker 4: that's you know, got them into the idea of owning,
Speaker 4: you know, secondhand clothes.
Speaker 8: Absolutely yeah, I mean gen Z are obsessed with thrifting.
Speaker 8: They're obsessed with secondhand and not buying stuff new. It's
Speaker 8: like I said, it's forty percent of their closet. So
Speaker 8: a really big part of how they're shopping today is
Speaker 8: already secondhand. And brands want to have a piece of that,
Speaker 8: but interestingly, we have actually seen it across all generations
Speaker 8: where for some of our brands, the customers getting involved
Speaker 8: with this are a.
Speaker 9: Lot older, but the fact that they can do this
Speaker 9: through the brand, they can go back and maybe resell
Speaker 9: and buy pre loved items through a brand that they
Speaker 9: know and trust versus a marketplace, is compelling them to.
Speaker 7: Start for the first time, which is exciting to see too.
Speaker 1: It made me wonder about something like the Real Real
Speaker 1: or something like that, what does this kind of cut
Speaker 1: into their business? I mean it has to, I guess ultimately,
Speaker 1: right or I don't know. What are you hearing?
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean it's this is a very fast growing market.
Speaker 8: It's going to secondhand is going to grow by one
Speaker 8: hundred billion in the next four years.
Speaker 7: So there's a lot of opportunity out there.
Speaker 8: And I think the way I think about it is
Speaker 8: when I'm buying new products, sometimes I like to go
Speaker 8: to a retailer and buy across a lot of brands.
Speaker 8: Sometimes I like to go direct to a brand and
Speaker 8: just buy directly through them. And so we see the
Speaker 8: secondhand market evolving in a similar way where there's always
Speaker 8: going to be a place for cross brand marketplaces like
Speaker 8: the Real Real or vined, but also brands.
Speaker 7: Will want to own that direct piece of the business.
Speaker 1: I love vintage.
Speaker 4: I'm curious, do you have vinded very od I've really
Speaker 4: started recently actually, so this is something that is a
Speaker 4: new world to me. And you know, in London I
Speaker 4: have a great range of charity shops that I shop from,
Speaker 4: but I feel like that this is this is elevated
Speaker 4: to a different level. But Emily, I had a question
Speaker 4: around the idea of is this also a quality control
Speaker 4: issue for the brands that they can make sure that
Speaker 4: the versions of their products that are out there are
Speaker 4: of a certain quality because they've at least had a
Speaker 4: touch with the process of resale.
Speaker 7: Absolutely.
Speaker 8: Yeah, Authentication, especially in the luxury sector is a huge
Speaker 8: risk for brands and they're seeing knockoffs on other marketplaces,
Speaker 8: and so one of the reasons to take this in
Speaker 8: house is to control that whole process. And we can
Speaker 8: put in place a lot more authentication measures because we're
Speaker 8: partnering directly with the brand than what's possible otherwise. So yeah,
Speaker 8: it's a really good point. I'm glad to hear that
Speaker 8: you're buying one secondhand as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. I think we all are right. I kind
Speaker 1: of love it, I have to say I also like
Speaker 1: the idea. I do think about the environment, environmental impact, right,
Speaker 1: because we talked about the fashion industry so often and
Speaker 1: the impact it has, you know, whether it's making a
Speaker 1: pair of genes, but even much more broadly about kind
Speaker 1: of disposable fashion, right fast fashion, and the impact it
Speaker 1: has on the environment. So I do think it's a
Speaker 1: smart thing for people to be doing. Talk to us
Speaker 1: at bit we are Bloomberg. Talk to us attleit more
Speaker 1: about your growth numbers, because they sound pretty dramatic, but
Speaker 1: give us an idea. You've been doing this for a bit,
Speaker 1: are you profitable? What's the growth plans here?
Speaker 7: Yeah, we're seeing a huge amount of growth. We've been
Speaker 7: around for three or four years, where you know.
Speaker 8: Still a startup, but now working with fifty global brands,
Speaker 8: including the likes of you know, New Balance, the north Face, Martin's,
Speaker 8: these brands that really want this to be a large
Speaker 8: proportion of their business. And so with that, we're seeing
Speaker 8: our business grow really significantly year on year and a
Speaker 8: lot more appetite.
Speaker 7: I think what's been exciting.
Speaker 8: Is, you know, maybe three years ago we were going
Speaker 8: out and talking to brands about why they should do this,
Speaker 8: and now they're coming to our knowing that this is
Speaker 8: going to be such a big part of their growth
Speaker 8: going forward.
Speaker 4: Where do you see the growth path coming from? Is
Speaker 4: it going to be those higher end brands who are
Speaker 4: you getting the most interest from?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 8: I would say it's everything from kind of the massive
Speaker 8: the market up to the luxury brands across honestly a
Speaker 8: range of different categories. We have a lot of success
Speaker 8: with kids brands with accessories like handbags, you know, outdoor brands,
Speaker 8: women's where men's wear, and even starting to have conversations
Speaker 8: outside of fashion too, which is a really interesting thing
Speaker 8: as we think about the other categories out there too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think what the kids' marketplace, it's kind of interesting.
Speaker 1: I'll say at Bloomberg there's like almost an internal marketplace,
Speaker 1: like somebody, oh.
Speaker 5: Well, I feel like that's everywhere.
Speaker 1: Especially because when they're little, right, because you barely use
Speaker 1: something and then someone's like, okay, here, you've got to
Speaker 1: take this like it's brand new, please like keep make
Speaker 1: use of it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, no, I mean look, and it kind of opens
Speaker 4: up a whole other world as well outside of fashion.
Speaker 4: Where else would you be thinking of going?
Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean home brands, kids gear, right, not just
Speaker 8: the clothing, but think about all of the things you
Speaker 8: buy buy winging of kids and that can be put
Speaker 8: back into use, electronics, gear like bikes and skis, things
Speaker 8: like that. I think that the world is our oyster.
Speaker 8: And I think, just to touch on your your sustainability piece, Carol,
Speaker 8: the fashion industry alone contributes eight percent of global greenhouse
Speaker 8: gas and gass emissions, which is you.
Speaker 7: Know, three x air travel.
Speaker 8: When you think about adding kind of home and all
Speaker 8: of the consumption that we do for all types of products,
Speaker 8: that is a huge impact that we're having from producing
Speaker 8: new stuff. And a lot of times the right product exists,
Speaker 8: it's just in someone else's hands today.
Speaker 7: So how do we make it easier for consumers to
Speaker 7: match up there?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it totally makes it make sense, and it certainly
Speaker 1: is something that's on consumers a lot more consumers minds
Speaker 1: when they go to do shopping. What's next for you guys, though?
Speaker 1: Do you stay? Do you stay you know, capital raises,
Speaker 1: stay private for a little bit longer? What's you're thinking
Speaker 1: in that front?
Speaker 7: Yeah, we'll stay private for a little bit longer and
Speaker 7: likely raise some more capital at some point, and I
Speaker 7: think just continue to grow.
Speaker 8: Look, we're having a lot of success in the US,
Speaker 8: in particular with the fashion industry, but thinking about international expansion,
Speaker 8: category expansion, and expanding our product to ultimately serve brands
Speaker 8: better and allow them to grow.
Speaker 7: This into a more significant portion of their business.
Speaker 4: What would be your next key international market.
Speaker 8: Oh, I'm from the UK, so that's a big one
Speaker 8: for us. A lot of demand from the UK and
Speaker 8: the rest of Europe. Honestly, we're seeing a lot of
Speaker 8: consumer behavior change and policy change over in Europe, so
Speaker 8: countries like in Scandinavia, Germany.
Speaker 7: France really far ahead of this trend on a lot
Speaker 7: of France. So I think we'll be their scene.
Speaker 1: Very cool staff, and I do think it's really so
Speaker 1: much more of a way people are shopping increasingly. I've
Speaker 1: done it like for a wedding for you know, just
Speaker 1: you can really tap into some great brands, some great
Speaker 1: things at a much reduced cost.
Speaker 4: Yeah, indeed, Emily, thanks so much for joining us. Emily Gitttens,
Speaker 4: their co founder and CEO of Archives, speaking to us
Speaker 4: from Berkeley in California. I think the high end. Part
Speaker 4: of this is the really interesting growth area. If you
Speaker 4: were able to access luxury brands in the way that's
Speaker 4: affordable and it can build. From the company's point of view,
Speaker 4: it makes sense as well, because it can build that
Speaker 4: brand loyalty that might turn into the you know, when
Speaker 4: someone moves up in income bracus, they might then be
Speaker 4: able to affoid something new.
Speaker 1: You know, absolutely, especially if it's like the first time
Speaker 1: you're buying something right and you're like, Okay, I kind
Speaker 1: of like this, so let me buy another.
Speaker 5: Remember your first designer handbag, Carol Masser.
Speaker 1: I might be gifted, Yeah, which is really killer. Carol
Speaker 1: Masser along with Stephen Carroll here on Bloomberg Business Week.
Speaker 1: Stephen in for Tim. He's normally host of Bloomberg Daybreak
Speaker 1: Asia Europe.
Speaker 5: I mean I could do both.
Speaker 1: You could do probably all of it, you know what
Speaker 1: you normally do a tease of do Bloomberg Daybreak Asia,
Speaker 1: Like at the end of our show, I'm just a default.
Speaker 5: Yeah, everything everywhere.
Speaker 1: Ale at once Burg Daybreak Europe.
Speaker 4: Thank you, You're very welcome.
Speaker 1: It was a Monday.
Speaker 4: Look well, actually, do you know what this kind of
Speaker 4: speaks to what we're going to talk about next because
Speaker 4: we're going to delve into a big global issue as
Speaker 4: well that we're going to be talking about. We've mentioned
Speaker 4: that it's Climate Week here in New York as well,
Speaker 4: but it's also World Alzheimer's Month, and World Alzheimer's Day
Speaker 4: was on the twenty first of September as well, and
Speaker 4: of course the real aim of that event is try
Speaker 4: and raise awareness about this illness. It just is affecting
Speaker 4: so many people all over the world.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's about fifty five million people that are believed
Speaker 1: to be living with Alzheimer's disease or other dementias. In
Speaker 1: the US alone, we're talking about almost seven million people,
Speaker 1: and that includes about two hundred thousand people under the
Speaker 1: age of sixty five with what they call younger on
Speaker 1: site Alzheimer's. So let's get to it, because I do
Speaker 1: feel like when we talk about the medical world, our healthcare,
Speaker 1: our treatments, that this is one of the things that
Speaker 1: a lot of companies, drug companies in particular, are working
Speaker 1: on to find a better way to treat it, find it,
Speaker 1: cure it if you will, kind of one of those
Speaker 1: holy grails. So on that we welcome Doctor Alicia al
Speaker 1: Jasiras Simmich, Professor of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology at the
Speaker 1: Mayo Clinic, with us from Rochester, Minnesota. Doctor, it's great
Speaker 1: to have you here with Stephen and myself when it
Speaker 1: first of all give us an idea of kind of
Speaker 1: where we are in terms of Alzheimer's. We through out
Speaker 1: some numbers, but it does sound like are we seeing
Speaker 1: more younger individuals getting it? Tell us what we are
Speaker 1: seeing on a global scale.
Speaker 3: Yes, you know, what we're seeing is in an increased
Speaker 3: number of individuals that are being diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease,
Speaker 3: in part because of the newer diagnostic options that are available,
Speaker 3: as well as the availability now of disease therapist to
Speaker 3: treat the disease and slow down the progression of the symptoms,
Speaker 3: so that that availability of therapies now has increased the
Speaker 3: need for diagnostic testing.
Speaker 4: Can you explain to us the importance of early diagnosis
Speaker 4: and how that feeds into then somebody's both care that
Speaker 4: they need, but also how it affects the evil of
Speaker 4: the disease.
Speaker 3: Yes, absolutely, you know. The early diagnosis is critical for
Speaker 3: patients presenting with symptoms of cognitive decline because the earlier
Speaker 3: that we can diagnose the patients with Alzheimer's disease. The
Speaker 3: earlier and the more timely the therapists will be. And
Speaker 3: the therapists that are available available today are meant to
Speaker 3: be used in patients where when the symptoms are still mild,
Speaker 3: because that's when they are more effective in slowing down
Speaker 3: the progression of the symptoms. And even in individuals that
Speaker 3: might not be eligible for the newer therapists, having an
Speaker 3: early diagnosis can help with lifestyle changes that might still
Speaker 3: benefit and improve their quality of life for a longer time.
Speaker 4: Can you give us some examples of what those lifestyle
Speaker 4: changes are. I think this is just an issue that
Speaker 4: so many of our listeners will be thinking about. This
Speaker 4: is something that is affecting I think of us. It's
Speaker 4: fair to say, so, what changes in how one's lifestyle
Speaker 4: might shift if you did have an early diagnosis?
Speaker 3: Yes, absolutely, you know. There are a number of modifiable
Speaker 3: lifestyle changes that have been described. Diet, exercise, smoking, These
Speaker 3: are all all different areas that can be approached to
Speaker 3: modified and improve their home.
Speaker 1: So tell us about the tests that you guys have developed.
Speaker 1: What do we need to know and is it put
Speaker 1: into effect yet? Or put into use.
Speaker 3: Yes, absolutely so the tests that we develop it is
Speaker 3: it measures one of the early changes that happen in
Speaker 3: the brain of patients with Alzheimer's disease, and this change
Speaker 3: is the accumulation of a protein name or call a
Speaker 3: beta amyloid, and these protein accumulate and forms black in
Speaker 3: the brain that eventually leads to the symptoms the patients developed.
Speaker 3: The test that we offer, which is called peet out
Speaker 3: to seventeen, is a blood test that allows for the
Speaker 3: detection of those the accumulation of that beta amyloid protein.
Speaker 5: In the brain.
Speaker 4: And how widespread is that testing being available? How quickly
Speaker 4: can it be? Can it be made available to a
Speaker 4: wider number of people?
Speaker 3: Yes, actually it is available to any provider around the world.
Speaker 3: Can order these test through Mayo clinic laboratories, and we
Speaker 3: do require that a provider actually ordered the test, so
Speaker 3: this is not a test that can be ordered by patients.
Speaker 3: And we also need to keep in mind that these
Speaker 3: tests at this time have been optimized to detect Alzheimer's
Speaker 3: diagnose Alzheimer's disease in patients with symptoms, so it is
Speaker 3: very important that it is performed in pais presented with
Speaker 3: symptoms of cognitive decline. But any provider can order that
Speaker 3: on their patients.
Speaker 1: What kind of symptoms, because, as you said, it's important
Speaker 1: to catch all of this early in order for a
Speaker 1: better outcome. So what kind of symptoms should be more
Speaker 1: likely so that a patient knows to go to their
Speaker 1: doctor and maybe ask about it.
Speaker 3: Yes, so in general, you know, there are symptoms of
Speaker 3: mild what we refer as mild cognitive impermits, so maybe
Speaker 3: some forgetfulness and some memory loss and sush. But what
Speaker 3: happens is that when these patients will go to the provider,
Speaker 3: they will do a number of a battery of tests
Speaker 3: to look at their cognitive performance, whether they can recall
Speaker 3: some objects or names, and various cognitive testing which then
Speaker 3: can determine whether they have a mild cognitive imperment. And
Speaker 3: those are the ones that will benefit modes from these
Speaker 3: tests at this time.
Speaker 5: What sort of interesting you getting?
Speaker 4: What the demand is there for this test from providers
Speaker 4: and is it from the US alone or is it
Speaker 4: more global?
Speaker 3: No, we receive samples from around the world actually, and
Speaker 3: there has been great interests. We are surpassing the test
Speaker 3: volumes that we have originally predicted. So there is a
Speaker 3: lot of excitement for the test because there is a
Speaker 3: need to be able to have a non invasive test
Speaker 3: that can help diagnose patients.
Speaker 1: Just real quickly ten seconds. Is it covered by insurance?
Speaker 1: Typically yes, it.
Speaker 3: Is covered by insurance, but the amount that is inverts.
Speaker 3: It depends on the insurance provider.
Speaker 1: Is an expensive test real quickly, It's.
Speaker 3: Cheaper than other modalities that are available today, such as
Speaker 3: the head which involved are looking for access all tuning
Speaker 3: the brain or a c SF this kind
Speaker 1: Of doctor Alisha Aljaciras SMIC, thank you so much