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How a neuroscientist invests in biopharma · Capital Ideas podcast

• 0:00
  - Hi, I'm Mike Gitlin. (upbeat music)
• 0:01
  Welcome to another episode of our "Capital Ideas" podcast.
• 0:04
  We get to know the people behind the portfolios,
• 0:07
  hear from portfolio managers and analysts,
• 0:09
  lessons learned, investment edge, their ideas,
• 0:13
  and a bit more about Capital Group.
• 0:14
  Today, we have Laura Nelson Carney with us.
• 0:17
  She's an equity analyst based in our London office.
• 0:20
  Join me as Laura breaks down how a scientist-turned-investor
• 0:24
  with global experience sees the future of health care
• 0:27
  and why her journey gives her an edge
• 0:29
  in spotting real innovation.
• 0:31
  Laura, welcome to the podcast.
• 0:33
  - Thank you very much for having me.
• 0:35
  - I'm glad you're here.
• 0:37
  You took an interesting path to get to Capital Group:
• 0:40
  academic science, pharmaceutical research and development,
• 0:43
  management consulting, sell-side research in Asia.
• 0:47
  So, that's just a really unique path
• 0:50
  before joining Capital Group eight years ago.
• 0:53
  Can you talk a little bit about that journey
• 0:56
  and some of the chapters in that journey
• 0:57
  and how you got here?
• 0:58
  - Well, I think I'm a good example
• 1:00
  that career paths are not always linear.
• 1:03
  I followed what I was most interested in
• 1:05
  and the people that I was most inspired by.
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  So, I started my career as a scientist in academia,
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  did a PhD and postdoc in neuroscience.
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  The first pivot I made was
• 1:14
  to the pharmaceutical industry out of academia,
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  which is something anathema to some academic scientists.
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  But I didn't like that some of the people around me
• 1:22
  couldn't answer the question of why they were working
• 1:25
  on one very narrow, esoteric question for several decades.
• 1:28
  I wanted to be more connected
• 1:30
  to why am I getting up every day to do this?
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  - The purpose. - The purpose.
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  And it was that everyone was working towards one common goal
• 1:37
  to develop new medicines, which was great.
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  I loved it.
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  Some years later, I met someone who worked at McKinsey,
• 1:42
  the management consulting company,
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  who told me that they were looking to hire some people
• 1:47
  who had spent a few years working in the pharma industry.
• 1:50
  And I realized I was intrigued to learn about
• 1:53
  how the rest of the business worked.
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  It gave me the chance to see
• 1:57
  sort of under the proverbial hood of many different pharma
• 2:00
  and biotech companies.
• 2:02
  The next pivot I made was into finance;
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  I went to work in the sell-side.
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  And then I was recruited by my favorite client,
• 2:08
  who is a Capital Group portfolio manager
• 2:10
  called Eu-Gene Cheah,
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  who remains one of my mentors and friends.
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  He was making the transition from doing both jobs
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  of being a pharma and biotech analyst
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  and also a diversified portfolio manager.
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  So, I replaced him.
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  - So, knowing how, because you have this great background,
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  you have a PhD in neuroscience,
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  so you have this wonderful academic background
• 2:33
  and that must help you as an investor in these companies
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  because you're not just doing financial modeling,
• 2:40
  you also know the science.
• 2:42
  So, can you tell a little bit how that shapes
• 2:45
  how you invest today?
• 2:47
  - It has a big impact.
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  I guess while my career path wasn't linear, now I feel
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  that I used all the things I did in those steps
• 2:55
  along the way every day in doing my investing role.
• 2:59
  The scientific part matters a lot.
• 3:02
  I lean into science a lot in how I do my job every day.
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  It's about finding new drugs that can be big,
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  can change the practice of medicine,
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  looking into new areas of biology
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  that are going to really be a profound benefit to patients.
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  So, I use it every day.
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  I go to a lot of medical conferences.
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  - And when you take along portfolio managers
• 3:21
  with you into the meeting and you're deep into the science
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  and they're riding along,
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  are they interested as much in the science
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  or are they looking forward to get back to the financials?
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  How do those conversations go?
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  - Well, I guess I modulate the meeting
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  a little bit depending on how to,
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  where it goes depending on the who is in the room.
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  But I think the best R&D leaders in pharma companies
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  are able to articulate very clearly in a way
• 3:46
  that generalist portfolio managers can understand
• 3:49
  the strategy of what they're working on and why,
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  and why it may be differentiated.
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  How it can make a difference.
• 3:55
  - Yeah, I guess they need to.
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  You need to bring that EQ
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  and the sort of lay person conversation into the room
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  to make sure they can communicate the story.
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  - And when I do the meetings on my own
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  or with one of my biotech and pharma colleagues,
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  I like to go-
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  - Then you go deep. - 10 miles deep.
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  - Got it. Okay.
• 4:10
  So, you lived all over the place.
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  You lived in U.S., Europe, Asia, eight years in Hong Kong.
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  Did it shape how you think of the health care industry
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  and innovation in general,
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  just being a citizen of the world, effectively?
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  - Ah, very much so actually.
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  I think it made me open-minded to the fact
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  that innovation can come from many places.
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  In biotech, there's been a long-held school of thought
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  that if it didn't happen in Boston
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  or the San Francisco Bay Area,
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  it's probably not innovative enough to care about.
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  And while I don't dismiss all of the amazing work
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  that's been done in those two locations,
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  there are many pockets of innovation in biotech now.
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  - [Mike] It's a big one.
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  - China in particular is one
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  that's really risen in recent years.
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  - Is China super important
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  in the biopharma innovation space?
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  Is it today? Will it become more so over time?
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  Give us an update on China.
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  - Historically, it hasn't been.
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  It's been a market where the pharmaceutical industry is
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  about old, sometimes quite low-quality generic drugs,
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  traditional Chinese medicines.
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  But that's all changed in the last 10 years,
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  especially in the recent few.
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  China is becoming a globally relevant source of innovation.
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  So, there's a wave of policies
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  that began about 20 years ago,
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  well, the most important ones about 10 years ago,
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  to encourage local companies to become innovative.
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  So, changing the way drugs got approved
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  to prioritize the path for more innovative drugs
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  versus the 20th generic drug
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  that's the same as all the others;
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  to begin reimbursing innovative medicine
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  in the national government-run health insurance program;
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  to change the way that capital markets work
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  to allow pre-revenue, pre-profit companies
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  to access capital markets; changing the IP,
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  the way the IP system works to create greater IP protection.
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  All of those things took time, but they really have worked.
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  There's a huge crop
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  of emerging innovative companies in China,
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  and bigger global companies have noticed.
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  They've been sort of shopping, if you will, in China,
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  licensing, even acquiring companies there
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  to augment their pipelines.
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  Big pharma has long sourced about half of its pipeline
• 6:22
  and portfolio externally, meaning from academia,
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  from small companies, by licensing or acquiring.
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  And last year, by deal value,
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  48% of assets licensed were Chinese.
• 6:33
  - Wow. I wouldn't have known that.
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  Is the Chinese government okay with that?
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  You think about it in terms
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  of them creating this intellectual capital
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  and then having it be acquired overseas.
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  - Well, it's an industry that on a long-range plan,
• 6:49
  they see as important to be globally competitive
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  and to contribute to the economy long term.
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  And becoming genuinely global means first clearing the path
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  for global companies to be inside of China,
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  so local companies can compete effectively with them there,
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  and then supporting them and starting
• 7:05
  to become more global. - That makes sense.
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  - There are a few that have become more global already
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  in their own right, but most of them,
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  just like biotech companies elsewhere,
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  they can only take drugs to a certain point.
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  And then they need help of bigger companies.
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  So they partner or license what they're doing.
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  And the same is true in China.
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  That's how they learn to be more global.
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  Some of them have done 50-50 partnerships
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  where they can learn from their bigger global partners about
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  how to be commercial outside of China.
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  - Well, I mean, you look at the auto industry and BYD
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  and what they've done.
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  China's emerging in some of these industries
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  as super powerful and competitive.
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  If you're a company that's headquartered
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  in Europe and the U.S., you obviously can take advantage
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  through acquisitions and licensing and partnerships.
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  But do you also worry about the advantage China may have
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  in terms of approvals, in terms of technology
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  that it's going to take share from you?
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  Do you think about that when you're thinking
• 8:01
  of those companies?
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  - I think it is a long-term risk.
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  China has a speed and cost advantage
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  in developing drugs right now.
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  And there's a hunger and a work ethic
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  that's a little different than in some big global companies.
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  I find it so energizing to go to China
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  and meet all these companies.
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  They move so fast and they're doing so much.
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  - It's interesting. It's changed a lot.
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  When you're looking at a biotech or a pharma company,
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  two questions sort of, what are you looking for?
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  What does good look like?
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  What are some of the things you see
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  that say this has the foundation for something
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  that can be super successful?
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  And then what are some red flags that come up that you say
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  that's just not going to work?
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  - Well, the answer is a little different
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  for big versus small companies.
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  For big diversified pharma companies,
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  I'm looking for companies with a base business,
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  meaning the sum of all the drugs that are already approved
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  that they're selling,
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  that is growing a little or at least stable.
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  - Strong foundation.
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  - Yeah, and then a strong R&D productivity
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  and a pipeline that includes one
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  or maybe several drugs that have the potential
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  to be transformational, to change one area of medicine
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  with a large unmet medical need
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  and the potential to become really big drugs.
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  Pharma stocks move on product cycles.
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  Big drugs that turn out to be even bigger than expected
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  and continue to beat the market's expectations;
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  and the multiples move with the duration of growth,
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  how far into the future you can see growth.
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  It's an industry with an inherent cyclicality.
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  We have a social contract with,
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  society has a social contract
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  with pharma companies to give them a protection
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  from copycat versions entering 20-year patent protection.
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  But it means that they become victims
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  of their own success, if you will.
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  Their biggest drugs lose patent protection,
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  and unless the engine is very productive to be able
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  to replace them with new things,
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  they go through very painful correction periods as well.
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  - Well, right upon approval the clock starts ticking.
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  - Yes. Actually the clock starts sticking before.
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  Usually patents are filed somewhere much earlier
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  in the development process.
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  - And what about the small companies? What there?
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  - The small companies,
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  it's about transformative science, working on,
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  the smaller companies tend to take more risk
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  and work on even more leading-edge,
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  newer areas than the big companies.
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  Big companies access that leading, with some exceptions,
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  but tend to access the most leading-edge science
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  from small companies.
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  So, I'm looking for great science, visionary leaders,
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  smart development programs that are realistic
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  and thoughtful about how the drugs will be used in the end.
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  But it's also an industry
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  where a lot of companies are acquired,
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  a lot of drugs get licensed.
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  So, I pay attention to
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  what I think big companies are interested in at the moment
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  and over the next few years, try to work backwards.
• 10:49
  - It's interesting because you have another colleague
• 10:52
  who will be a future podcast guest coming up,
• 10:56
  Judith Finegold.
• 10:57
  And you two travel a lot together.
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  Can you talk a bit about how you collaborate?
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  You have different responsibilities and different mindsets
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  in how you approach things, but how do you collaborate
• 11:08
  and sort of collect the mosaic
• 11:10
  that you're looking at together?
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  - Well, her responsibility is U.S. pharma and biotech
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  and me ex-U.S.
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  So, we collaborate a lot.
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  It's a very global industry, more so than most.
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  Cancer knows no borders.
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  All of the pharma companies,
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  big and small, are competing with each other,
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  collaborating with each other,
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  acquiring, licensing things from each other.
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  So, one of Capital's competitive advantages is
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  being truly global.
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  And I think in this industry in particular,
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  we can really lean into that.
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  We have a constant dialogue,
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  sharing little tidbits of information. Something I saw
• 11:47
  a small company in Japan is doing
• 11:48
  that's relevant to one of her,
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  one of companies in her coverage is doing.
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  Or realizing that there's a trend in a certain area
• 11:55
  that bigger companies are looking to acquire drugs in.
• 11:59
  And it's been hugely additive to us,
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  and it's helped us to connect the dots in ways
• 12:04
  that sometimes we've anticipated changes before others have.
• 12:08
  - Yeah, that's a huge benefit.
• 12:09
  - [Laura] And it's fun traveling together.
• 12:10
  - Well, it's fun, but it's also, it's a huge benefit.
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  Like you said, it's a big world,
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  and there's so much innovation splitting up that world,
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  but then bringing it back together
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  so you can share best practices and what's happening
• 12:23
  and data points that it might impact another geography.
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  I think that's excellent.
• 12:29
  You are in an innovative space,
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  and so it's humbling how much changes occurs
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  and the speed of those changes.
• 12:39
  What are some of the lessons you've learned?
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  As you've taken this on, you've changed careers,
• 12:43
  you've been at Capital Group now for a little while.
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  What are some of the lessons you've learned in this journey?
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  - Well, the biggest one is be humble and be hungry
• 12:52
  to learn new things all the time.
• 12:54
  But the ones that are more specific to investing,
• 12:56
  I would highlight a few things.
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  One is about investing in small versus big companies.
• 13:02
  Small-cap biotech investing is very different than investing
• 13:06
  in large, mature, diversified companies.
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  It's a cash-burning industry
• 13:10
  where these companies aren't profitable.
• 13:12
  Many of them are not even generating any revenue.
• 13:14
  So, there's a lot of binary risk.
• 13:16
  They have one or two drugs in their pipeline.
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  If it works well, the share price can go up 2, 3, 10x,
• 13:22
  and if it doesn't, it can fall 70, 80, 90% in one day.
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  So- - Super binary.
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  - So, to diversify that binary risk,
• 13:30
  we can hold them in baskets,
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  rather than just holding one or two,
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  to create a sort of synthetic portfolio
• 13:36
  that has exposure to different disease areas,
• 13:40
  different drug targets, different modalities.
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  But one of the lessons I learned is
• 13:44
  don't make the basket too small
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  or it won't function as intended.
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  If it functions as intended, you have one or two,
• 13:50
  maybe several, that go up a lot;
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  one or two that don't work out and fall a lot;
• 13:54
  and the others are somewhere in between.
• 13:56
  But after COVID, interest rates were high.
• 14:01
  It's an industry that depends a lot
• 14:02
  on public market financing.
• 14:04
  There was kind of a biotech winter.
• 14:06
  So, I tilted the mix of smaller companies
• 14:08
  that I held towards those that are a little bit less risky.
• 14:12
  So, a little bit later-stage pipelines,
• 14:15
  maybe a little bit bigger pipelines,
• 14:16
  a little more cash in their balance sheets,
• 14:18
  maybe a little bit of revenue.
• 14:21
  And that was the right decision,
• 14:22
  but I didn't hold enough of them
• 14:23
  and the basket didn't work out as intended.
• 14:25
  And there was a little bit of,
• 14:29
  I sold some of the wrong things for the wrong reasons.
• 14:32
  I sold some of the companies
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  where nothing had gone wrong
• 14:36
  with my original scientific hypothesis,
• 14:39
  nothing wrong with the data, nothing wrong
• 14:40
  with the execution,
• 14:42
  but because of the macro environment
• 14:45
  and a kind of risk-off mindset,
• 14:47
  it was tough for small companies.
• 14:49
  I sold them because the liquidity had gotten too low,
• 14:51
  and the companies had become too small.
• 14:53
  But there were three of them that less than a year
• 14:55
  after I sold them were acquired by pharma companies,
• 14:58
  10x what I sold them for.
• 14:59
  - The science, if the thesis and the science still works.
• 15:01
  - If the thesis isn't broken, don't sell.
• 15:03
  - Yeah. Those are good lessons earned.
• 15:05
  A bigger basket to be able to withstand
• 15:07
  some of those less-than-stellar, binary outcomes
• 15:11
  and then getting enough right in there,
• 15:14
  it will give you a good return over time
• 15:16
  for the overall basket.
• 15:19
  You have a unique investment edge.
• 15:21
  Every one of our 400 investment professionals
• 15:24
  around the world in both equities and fixed income
• 15:26
  have a unique investment edge.
• 15:28
  So, what's yours?
• 15:30
  - I think it's three things,
• 15:31
  two of which we've touched on already.
• 15:33
  One is that I've had the privilege
• 15:35
  to work in and around drug discovery and development
• 15:37
  in multiple different ways.
• 15:39
  I've seen it from different lenses,
• 15:40
  how hard it is from a scientific perspective,
• 15:44
  how it works inside different, big companies.
• 15:47
  Change is hard.
• 15:47
  It's hard to make decisions that are big shifts.
• 15:51
  A second is I've lived all over the world,
• 15:53
  so I think I have a more global perspective than some others
• 15:57
  and more open-minded to seeing new things emerging
• 15:59
  from unexpected places.
• 16:01
  And the third is I have a strong stomach
• 16:05
  for volatility and risk.
• 16:06
  - Well, you have to.
• 16:08
  In your sector, you need to have that strong stomach
• 16:11
  for volatility and risk.
• 16:13
  Got it.
• 16:16
  AI, have to ask the question.
• 16:19
  Everyone is talking about it in every industry.
• 16:22
  Bring it to life for us in health care.
• 16:25
  - I think it's one of the tougher nuts to crack for AI.
• 16:28
  Human biology is very, very complex
• 16:30
  and there are many parts of it
• 16:31
  that we still incompletely understand.
• 16:34
  I think that we're probably overestimating
• 16:37
  the very short-term impacts,
• 16:39
  but profoundly underestimating the long-term impact.
• 16:43
  And very specific to drug discovery,
• 16:45
  it will speed the process, it will reduce the cost,
• 16:49
  it will increase the probability of success.
• 16:52
  Right now it's a tough industry.
• 16:54
  Only 10% of drugs that enter phase one clinical trials
• 16:57
  reach the market.
• 16:58
  And of those only a fraction
• 16:59
  recoup their cost of development.
• 17:01
  So, the attrition is high.
• 17:03
  Improving it even a little makes a very material difference.
• 17:07
  Every big pharma company is using those words
• 17:11
  and has hired people, set up AI teams in different ways
• 17:14
  and is using AI in different ways.
• 17:16
  They all have lots of examples of pilot projects
• 17:20
  or specific use cases
• 17:21
  where you can see a tangible difference,
• 17:23
  but it hasn't yet rolled up to something
• 17:26
  that us as dispassionate public market investors
• 17:29
  just looking at the spreadsheet can see
• 17:31
  and the totality of the company's P&L,
• 17:33
  that it's changing the return on R&D investment
• 17:37
  or the timelines or anything like that.
• 17:39
  I think it will, but it will take time.
• 17:41
  And there are a lot of small companies emerging as well
• 17:43
  that are focused on AI drug discovery.
• 17:45
  And there's a few of them
• 17:46
  with drugs in phase two clinical trials
• 17:48
  that were discovered by AI.
• 17:50
  - And so, if we fast forward 10 years,
• 17:54
  and I agree with you, I think there's an underestimation
• 17:57
  of the long-term impact as it relates to health care.
• 17:59
  But can AI change life expectancy
• 18:03
  if you look out 10, 20, 30 years?
• 18:08
  - Probably.
• 18:08
  I think, I mean,
• 18:11
  there's a part of biotech that's focused on longevity,
• 18:15
  trying to figure out how to slow cellular aging
• 18:18
  and how to increase healthy lifespan.
• 18:21
  Looking backwards, it's been kind of a graveyard
• 18:23
  of tough companies that didn't really work out.
• 18:27
  Living longer isn't an approvable indication
• 18:29
  with regulators like the FDA,
• 18:31
  but treating the diseases associated with aging is.
• 18:37
  Yeah, I think it probably will.
• 18:39
  - So, what are you most excited about?
• 18:41
  There's lots of new science out there.
• 18:43
  What are you most excited about?
• 18:45
  - Well, one of the reasons I love working in this sector is
• 18:48
  that there's, it profoundly affects people's lives,
• 18:51
  and there's always something new.
• 18:53
  And we're in a period of something of a renaissance
• 18:56
  of innovation in this space.
• 18:57
  So, there's a lot of new things going on that are exciting.
• 19:00
  But a few that I think are important
• 19:02
  and I've been spending time on are,
• 19:05
  one is a little bit outside of my narrow pharma
• 19:07
  and biotech focus, but there's been a lot of innovation
• 19:10
  in the diagnostic space.
• 19:12
  And moving towards diagnosing disease earlier means
• 19:14
  that drugs we develop have a greater potential
• 19:17
  of having curative intent rather than merely managing
• 19:20
  symptoms or slowing the rate of decline.
• 19:22
  This is particularly true in cancer,
• 19:24
  but also in other areas.
• 19:27
  A second is that the emergence of cells
• 19:30
  and genes in medicine, which as medicines,
• 19:33
  which began some years ago, is really important,
• 19:36
  as important as moving from chemicals
• 19:39
  to proteins a few decades ago.
• 19:41
  One area of genetic medicine that I think
• 19:43
  will have a huge impact is called interference RNA.
• 19:46
  This is a way to silence genes without cutting the DNA,
• 19:49
  which brings some risks, and it lends itself well
• 19:52
  to treating big chronic diseases
• 19:54
  because it can be dosed infrequently, monthly,
• 19:57
  quarterly, even yearly.
• 19:59
  It's relatively cheap to manufacture
• 20:01
  and can be used in many different ways.
• 20:05
  So, the first generation of companies
• 20:07
  like Alnylam, Arrowhead, Dicerna,
• 20:09
  really pioneered this field,
• 20:11
  but there's an army of more than 50 companies in China
• 20:14
  that are working on the next generation approaches as well.
• 20:16
  So, figuring out how to deliver
• 20:18
  to different tissues beyond the liver,
• 20:20
  the first ones are all delivered to the liver,
• 20:22
  and working on new targets.
• 20:23
  - So, that's really early.
• 20:25
  I mean, that's something that's early on and will take-
• 20:28
  - Well, there's six or eight RNAi drugs approved already.
• 20:31
  - Okay. - The first generation.
• 20:32
  - And this long-term application,
• 20:37
  you think that's going to take,
• 20:39
  if you look at six or eight,
• 20:40
  is it 20 or 40 in the next few years
• 20:44
  or is that going to take another 5 to 10 years?
• 20:46
  - Ah, well-
• 20:47
  - [Mike] Just trying to give folks a sense of
• 20:48
  where we stand.
• 20:49
  - The pipeline is huge.
• 20:50
  In the 2030s, we'll see many of these drugs approved.
• 20:52
  - Got it. - So, those
• 20:53
  that are liver-targeted,
• 20:54
  we'll see a bunch of approvals between now and 2030.
• 20:57
  And we're seeing those targeted towards other tissues,
• 21:01
  brain, heart, lung, adipose tissue, muscle,
• 21:06
  they're all, phase one are the most advanced ones.
• 21:09
  - Okay. - 2030 plus.
• 21:11
  - We'll watch that. 2030.
• 21:14
  Capital Group turns 100 years old in 2031.
• 21:17
  We'll measure both at the time and see how both are doing.
• 21:20
  Okay, I'm going to take a little break from that
• 21:22
  just to do our office treasure hunt.
• 21:26
  I think this is...
• 21:28
  I love all the office treasure hunt things we find,
• 21:31
  but I found this one to be one of the most interesting ones
• 21:34
  in your office.
• 21:35
  It's also on the screen behind us, but most people listen.
• 21:40
  Will you describe what I have in my hands
• 21:42
  and what's on the screen behind me?
• 21:44
  - It's a framed photo,
• 21:46
  a magazine cover from Time Magazine in 1959.
• 21:50
  It's my grandfather.
• 21:51
  His name's Columbus Iselin,
• 21:53
  and he was a prominent oceanographer.
• 21:56
  It's got some ocean scenery and some ship equipment
• 22:00
  and a picture of a big ship that he sailed around on.
• 22:02
  But he died before I was born,
• 22:04
  so I never met him
• 22:05
  but have always been fascinated by him,
• 22:07
  which is why I keep that in my office.
• 22:10
  He's one of the reasons that I wanted to become a scientist,
• 22:14
  in addition to my own father was a scientist too.
• 22:17
  - It's just amazing. July 6th, 1959.
• 22:20
  The magazine was 25 cents at the time.
• 22:23
  And to have your grandfather who's an oceanographer
• 22:26
  on the cover of Time Magazine,
• 22:29
  super cool. Thank you for sharing that.
• 22:31
  - He was a professor at Harvard
• 22:32
  and he ran the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.
• 22:34
  And if you go there, you can still see
• 22:35
  his name around the place. - Oh, okay.
• 22:37
  That's not too far from a place I visit often.
• 22:39
  I'll go and check that out.
• 22:41
  Mentors, can you give us one or two mentors
• 22:44
  that have changed your career?
• 22:47
  - I'll bring the one that I spoke about before,
• 22:50
  Eu-Gene Cheah.
• 22:51
  So, he is why I'm here at Capital,
• 22:53
  and he continues to be an important mentor for me.
• 22:56
  I travel with him often.
• 22:57
  We have lots of discussion and debate about science
• 23:01
  and pharma and biotech companies.
• 23:03
  But what I really learned from him is,
• 23:05
  and love about him is the clarity
• 23:07
  with which he sees the world and sees what matters.
• 23:11
  He's been a really great pharma and biotech investor.
• 23:14
  I've learned a lot from him.
• 23:15
  - Excellent. We're going to finish up with two things.
• 23:18
  One, we're going to do two truths and a lie.
• 23:22
  So, these are fun facts about you,
• 23:24
  and one of them is fake news. So, I'll list them.
• 23:28
  You got your pilot's license when you were 17 years old.
• 23:32
  Your home has a bunch of twos:
• 23:35
  two kids, two dogs, two horses, probably two other things.
• 23:40
  And you were born in Australia.
• 23:42
  Which one of those is fake news, Laura?
• 23:46
  - The third one. My husband is Australian.
• 23:48
  - Okay, so all the other ones are true,
• 23:50
  and your husband is Australian.
• 23:53
  I want to show you a picture,
• 23:54
  last thing before I ask you what you're grateful for.
• 23:57
  And I'd love for you, also from your office,
• 24:01
  I would love for you to take it
• 24:03
  and describe it for folks who are listening.
• 24:06
  - This is a photo of me when I'm 17,
• 24:09
  standing with my father on the wing of a single prop plane.
• 24:13
  So, I got my pilot's license when I was 17,
• 24:16
  private pilot's license in a single prop plane.
• 24:18
  And he did as well at the same time.
• 24:21
  - So, do you still, do you still fly?
• 24:25
  If not, do you want to return to it?
• 24:27
  Is it a passion?
• 24:29
  - I let it lapse when I lived in Hong Kong
• 24:31
  because there was nowhere to go,
• 24:33
  and I couldn't enter Chinese airspace.
• 24:36
  (both chuckle)
• 24:37
  I would like to-
• 24:37
  - Well, you could,
• 24:38
  but it wouldn't have turned out very well.
• 24:39
  Yeah.
• 24:40
  - I would love to come back to it.
• 24:41
  It was, I really, really enjoyed it.
• 24:45
  - We're going to finish up with what you are grateful for.
• 24:48
  We have our "Capital Ideas" mug,
• 24:51
  our gratitude, be obsessively grateful mug.
• 24:53
  We will send it to you in London.
• 24:55
  We will not make you put this in your carry-on.
• 24:57
  But I will hand it to you
• 24:59
  and ask you to share- - Thank you. It is big.
• 25:00
  - with folks, what you were grateful for.
• 25:03
  - Well, I'm grateful for my family.
• 25:06
  I have a husband and two wonderful teenage children
• 25:08
  who have been really supportive of me.
• 25:12
  This is not a nine-to-five job and I love it.
• 25:16
  So, they're understanding about me
• 25:19
  always thinking about work and stocks.
• 25:21
  And they have all of their own passions
• 25:24
  and adventures as well.
• 25:26
  I owe a lot to my parents.
• 25:28
  They were very supportive of me early on.
• 25:30
  I mentioned my father in the photo
• 25:31
  was a scientist as well,
• 25:32
  and a big part of why I wanted to be a scientist.
• 25:35
  He taught me about entrepreneurial spirit
• 25:38
  and taking calculated risks
• 25:39
  and also about the value of compound interest very early.
• 25:42
  (both chuckle)
• 25:43
  My mother as well taught me a lot
• 25:45
  about hard work and perseverance.
• 25:46
  - Well, I am glad we found you and you found us,
• 25:50
  because having your experience, from everything you did
• 25:54
  before you came to Capital Group,
• 25:56
  taking that, translating that into finding great companies
• 26:00
  that can benefit our clients, is super important.
• 26:03
  So, I'm glad you found Capital, we found you.
• 26:05
  You're doing a great job here.
• 26:07
  Thank you for sharing your wisdom with us
• 26:09
  and spending some time with us.
• 26:10
  - Thank you very much for having me.
• 26:12
  (upbeat music)