Evinova CTO on AI's 'Productivity Paradox'
Evinova CTO Sean Connolly argued that the current lack of ROI from many enterprise AI investments represents a "productivity paradox" common during major technological shifts. Citing a 2025 MIT report, he noted that while 95% of firms saw no return, this is a normal part of the transformation curve. He described the current shift as AI 3.0, where agentic AI acts as the "glue" for complex workflows.
- Evinova was launched by pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca in November 2023 to commercialize the digital technology solutions it had already developed and used internally for its own clinical trials. The company operates as a separate health-tech business, offering its AI-powered tools to other pharma, biotech, and clinical research organizations. - The productivity paradox was first noted by economist and Nobel laureate Robert Solow in 1987, who quipped, "You can see the computer age everywhere but in the productivity statistics." The phenomenon describes the historical lag between investment in a general-purpose technology, like computers or electricity, and measurable gains in national productivity, which often took decades to materialize. - Agentic AI systems differ from traditional automation by operating autonomously to execute complex, multi-step workflows with minimal human oversight. These agents are designed with core components for planning, memory, and the ability to use various software tools to achieve a goal, rather than just following a predefined, rigid script. - In the field of clinical development, AI is being used to optimize trial design, accelerate patient recruitment by analyzing health records, and reduce trial costs. For example, Evinova's platform has reportedly achieved 5% to 7% cost savings per study for its partners. - Evinova's leadership team includes President Cristina Durán, who previously served as AstraZeneca's Chief Digital Health Officer, and Chief Data Science & AI Officer Jiajie Zhang. - The company is actively signing deals with major pharmaceutical firms to integrate its technology. Bristol Myers Squibb, Astellas Pharma, and AstraZeneca itself are all deploying Evinova's AI-native platform to make their clinical trial design and execution more efficient.
