Warner Thomas and Munjal Shah

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
This podcast is presented by the TowerBrook Healthcare Institute.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:03)
Incumbents and Insurgents in Healthcare with Eric Larsen.

**SPEAKER_1** (0:07)
This presentation is for informational purposes only. Please review the full disclaimer at the end of the episode.

**Eric Larsen** (0:13)
Ian, good morning. Actually, we're in London, and I'm so disoriented on the time. Is it morning? You just arrived.

**Warner Thomas** (0:20)
I just arrived. Here we are at our annual meeting. So it's just nice to be able to do this in person versus zooming an intro. No, it's morning, but it's fine.

**Eric Larsen** (0:31)
Look, I love London, but they have an aversion to air conditioning. It is sweltering here, but it's all good.

**Warner Thomas** (0:39)
I will not be leaving the Iron Law.

**Eric Larsen** (0:41)
It's good.
So all right. I love that we're in London for a lot of reasons. One, it's just a magnificent city. Two, it's arguably the second nucleus of AI innovation. I mean, Demis is here, Google DeepMind originated here.

**Warner Thomas** (0:58)
So where can you see the future first in San Francisco or London?

**Eric Larsen** (1:02)
100 percent San Francisco.
So for AGM at Ian's Instigation and Invitation, we're going to do a fireside chat tomorrow night with former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. We're going to talk a lot about the geopolitical implications of this, and not just the transatlantic partnership, but the trans-pacific partnership slash confrontation in the domain of AI between China and the US. But I think indisputably San Francisco is the center of the universe, and we recorded this podcast of Warner Thomas and Munjal Shah, Sutter and Hippocratic AI respectively in San Francisco. I know you have deep ambivalence towards San Francisco.

**Warner Thomas** (1:41)
No, not deep ambivalence, not deep ambivalence. I think it's heading in the right direction, and I love eating out burger, so we're all good.

**Eric Larsen** (1:47)
That's very true. Ian drags me in and out burger, and it's inedible. I know I just lost half of our audience. But okay, so I'll set the stage. We are, for this installment of Incumbents and Insurgents, really privileged to have two dear friends and two luminaries in each of their respective spheres. Warner Thomas is the CEO of Sutter, and Sutter in my estimation under Warner's leadership is one of the two or three most progressive pioneering installers of AI.
If I'm going to label this particular podcast, I would call it From Invention to Installation, because we talked deeply about that. Now, they're in the middle of finalizing a merger with Alina, so a non-contiguous major merger. When it's completed, it'll be a 27 billion revenue, 105,000 thereabouts associate health system, and I think that probably makes them the fourth or maybe the fifth largest health system not-for-profit in the country. But the reason we chose Warner, actually, let me ask you, why are we so excited to have Warner here?

**Warner Thomas** (2:55)
Well, look, I think a couple of things. One is it's nice after a run of episodes with some iconic personalities in their own right, to have another, to have another just another edition, another episode with an incumbent and insurgent. I just really enjoyed, I mean, listening to the raw footage. And I was just texting Warner about this. Just loved to hear the different views and hear things that they potentially disagreed upon or have different vantage points on, but also the way that they're working to work together. I thought it was fascinating. But back to your question on Warner. I mean, look, Warner is in one regard meat and potatoes. I mean, CPA, operations inside of a health system, a regional system goes on to lead Oshner, goes on to lead Oshner during Katrina, which is no small feat, goes to Sutter, which was not on its best feat at that moment.
And now, look, you just gave some of the high level description of what he's doing.
And in his market, he's just a fearless leader. He understands that the value of building an effective team, he refers to this, the value of evolving, of the leader needing to constantly evolve and change, especially with the speed of the market. And so while he's meat, potatoes and brass tacks, at the same time, he brings it, he takes that attitude, he takes that sense of curiosity that he has, in matter of factness, to the front lines. And I think that is, I think it's incredibly refreshing, because he's not the type that's just dealing at 50,000 feet and up. He brings it right down. And if he can't land the plan, plan to get frustrated, he moves on to the next thing. And I think that's a really refreshing, appropriate perspective right now.