by Edward Qualtrough

HealthUnlocked CTO Joe McFadden 2019 CIO Summit video interview – Sustainability and startup growth

Feature
Nov 22, 2019
IT Leadership

Credit: IDG

HealthUnlocked CTO Joe McFadden called on CIOs, CTOs and the wider tech sector to use its influence and play its part in helping the UK and beyond shift to a zero carbon and sustainable future.

The former Royal Opera House CTO was speaking to CIO UK Senior Online Editor Thomas Macaulay in a video interview at the 2019 CIO Summit, recorded after his keynote presentation about technology leadership for CIOs and CTOs in the age of climate crisis.

“Sustainability and climate change is a huge topic, and I think it can’t be understated how important is the tech sector to be using the power it has, both directly within our own organisation, but also in influencing the wider economy, to try and help the whole world shift to this zero carbon and sustainable future that we all need to be doing everything we can to achieve in the next 10 years,” McFadden said.

McFadden, who spoke to the CIO UK podcast at the start of 2019, added that it was refreshing to hear CIOs discuss bringing their whole self to their work, whether that was related to soft skills, their citizenship and important issues like sustainability, and that it was an exciting period of growth working in the startup world.

“HealthUnlocked is building the largest patient network in the world,” he said. “The network is helping people suffering from over 650 conditions currently and growing all the time, to connect with peers, to share experiences and get advice, but also to connect that to medical advice.

“This is all underpinned by our health graph technology, which is a machine learning-based platform that puts the natural language an individual uses in describing either their health conditions or the problems that might cause, whether that might be things like anxiety or sleeplessness or depression, and how that connects through to an ontology related to medical conditions and treatments.

“We’re very much focused on growth; so particularly growing the platform and the engagement on the platform.”

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