Luis Santiago, CEO at PEGASI

Luis Santiago is PEGASI's CEO and CTO. By training, he is a social communicator and marketing and public relations professor. By profession, he is a self-taught programmer, technology project manager, and Product Owner, with more than 14 years of experience in the area. He has ventured into banking, IT, and Digital Health. Luis was recognized in 2016 as one of the Young Leaders of the Americas by the American State Department, and in 2020 as one of the 35 Innovators under 35 in Latin America by the MIT Technology Review magazine. He has participated in dozens of international forums and events pointing out the importance of Healthcare digitalization in Latin America.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:18

Radio, Pandora or Deser. Welcome to the Latin Leaders Podcast, a conversation with leaders who have succeeded or plan to succeed in Latin America. Today, our guest is Luis Santiago. Luis is Peas, c e o and c t o. Luis was recognizing 2016 as one of the young leaders of the Americas by the American State Department. And in 2020, as one of the 35 innovators under 35 in Latin America by the M I T Technology Review Magazine, he has participated in doses of international forums and events pointing out the importance of healthcare digitalization in Latin America. So, Luis, it's great to have you here today. Welcome to the show.

Speaker 2: 1:04

Thank you very much, Julio. It's great to be here and, and share this space that, uh, many leaders in the area have shared before. So it's a privilege anar.

Speaker 1: 1:13

Awesome. Thank you for that. I appreciate it. So, Luis, tell us about your journey. How is it that you got to where you are?

Speaker 2: 1:21

Well, thank you. Um, yeah, we pegasi have a background before working in the healthcare IT area. We had a company in Venezuela. Uh, we closed that company during 2017, of course, uh, due to the situation that we have in the country. Uh, at the time of closing, we had around 8,000 users that we had, uh, digitally transformed, uh, using EHRs in our Eerp software. And we were managing around two electronic medical records in the country. Um, so we were in contact during 1617 with many facilitators, and that said that it would be a great idea to extend what we were doing for Venezuela to the rest of the, of the region. So, um, afterwards, uh, in two 19 we got into startup Chile, which is a program that's conducted by the Chilean government. And, uh, we got some grant funding and we found here in CHI extended to the US and we're now covering five countries in Latin America with the services that we provide.

Speaker 1: 2:26

Beautiful. Wow. That's quite impressive.<laugh>. Thank you. I, I wasn't sure about the startup Chile part of your story. I didn't know about it. I don't remember that part of it. I mean, that's quite a program that Chile has is an example in Latin America.

Speaker 2: 2:41

Exactly. And it, it's starting to, to be promoted to other countries. Actually, startup is starting to be a success case in, in many countries. In, in Latin America. Uh, we, we have the, the, the knowledge of, uh, certain programs in Columbia that are doing exactly the same. We have, uh, Puerto Rico's called, called parallel 18. Uh, the previous, uh, director was a director for Startup Chi as well. I

Speaker 1: 3:05

Read it, yes. Yeah,

Speaker 2: 3:07

Exactly. And, and it's a program that, um, these are programs are super essential, uh, in, uh, creating an ecosystem for, for startups to grow in those spaces and then start expanding from those specific countries and, and starting exporting other parts of America. So where, where we didn't see the opportunity in Venezuela inability of the country, we, we found opportunity and started more extending from chi to other parts of America emerge.

Speaker 1: 3:38

Okay. Very good. Alright, so Luis, let's talk about trends. What, what do you see happening in Latin America, uh, from the political, economic, or social standpoint that is relevant to our discussion today?

Speaker 2: 3:52

Well, and that's a great question. Um, we are currently focused on oncology. So I'm starting seeing the trends in the, in the area. Um, we, we recently were reviewing, uh, many of the reports from global, uh, starting. And we saw the number of cases in the cases in drastic, uh, one of the reasons cancer, some medical circles called, uh, middle class disease. Uh, cancer happens when you don't die, other things<laugh>. So

Speaker 1: 4:27

I didn't know that. I mean, that's fuzzy, maybe. So middle class disease,

Speaker 2: 4:31

<laugh> Exactly. It happens, for example, when you have Africa and Latin America, uh, overcoming diseases such as small books or, uh, dengue, malaria, uh, then people grow old enough to, to have cancer. Uh, in the case of Africa particularly, it's being called an epidemic. Right now you have around three and cases reported every year when there were 20 years ago, uh, or very few, many years ago. So in, in that sense, uh, Latin America is starting to see a huge trend in, in cancer developing in the region. Uh, the, the, the first and most prevalent one is, uh, breast cancer, and the second one is cervical cancer. In many cases, cervical cancer specifically is caused by classes 16, 18 high risk, uh, PPI virus. And of course, if you start seeing papillomavirus as something that's, uh, an, an sti uh, sexually transmitted disease, uh, std I'm sorry, then you start seeing the trend of, uh, how cancer spreads like an epidemic. So, uh, it, it's very interesting that, uh, when you start seeing the diseases that the, the people have, uh, then you start seeing that, uh, these diseases are related to overcoming, uh, extreme poverty in the region and, um, people increasing their lifespan. So you start seeing, uh, diseases that have been prevalent in the developed world, and they're starting to show up in the developing world, and we are prepared to deal with malaria. We are prepared to deal with, um, we are prepared to deal with, I don't know, small books, but we are not prepared to deal with cancer. So there's a huge trend in the developing world to start preparing for these, uh, middle class diseases. Um, and, and, and it's interesting because these are niche that are not developing medicine in the region. So there's a huge need for technology. There's a huge need for, for awareness, and there's a huge need for education of people to, in order to avoid, uh, developing these diseases

Speaker 1: 6:45

And screening, I would say too, right? Yeah. I mean, innovative technologies, as you correctly said to screen patients, because now, um, you, we have, um, newer technologies, for example, just to give you an idea, I'm dealing with a client of us who has probably the only device in the world that can detect the change of temperature in the breast.

Speaker 2: 7:14

Okay.

Speaker 1: 7:14

Prior to, to a woman going to mammography. So you have this little device, it's a$10,$20 device that you get at the drugstore. You put it in the fridge, and just every three months or so, just, uh, put it next to your breast and then it will give you an indication of, uh, a change in temperature so that you have an alert, uh, you tell your doctor and then you get sent to mammography.

Speaker 2: 7:41

So Exactly,

Speaker 1: 7:42

Yeah. Another technologies like that I've

Speaker 2: 7:44

Sent to, no, and, and it's amazing. Uh, these are very, very incredible technologies. Uh, the, one of the key advantages of technology is that, uh, the sooner you develop the, that technology and you have that technology in the market, uh, for longer lifespans, uh, then of course the technology can become cheaper. And it's something that's, uh, something that can be acquired and massified in the, the<inaudible> world, for example.

Speaker 1: 8:11

Exactly. Exactly. Alright, Luis, so let's talk about what you guys are doing with psi. What problem are you guys trying to solve with the, the, the company and what challenges are you facing in doing business in, in Chile and the other countries in the region?

Speaker 2: 8:30

No, that's great, and thank you for that question. Um, pretty much the thei is reducing, uh, time for, uh, cancer, um, diagnostic and time to treatment by half, uh, for the developing world. Um, this problem merges, like I I said before, there, there are some figures you have with cancer in 2020 and race between comes specifically for, from American Africa. And, uh, we have an disadvantage, uh, when for cancer detection treatment, 60 days, um, in Latin America, the meantime days. So there, there are some research that indicate that for every 30 days that you take patient reduced by. So yeah, you started with a handicap when dealing with cancer in our regions, you might have hundred, 2,050 days before you get a, a certain diagnosis, uh, from the patient. So, uh, that means that, uh, for regions such as Latin America, Africa, south Asia, dealing with cancer is even more expensive than, uh, not never to mention that the the dropping quality of care and quality of life for those patients, but it's actually more expensive. Cause when you start treating the patient, the patient is in a, in a stage that's further ahead, when you might have found them in the develop world, in stage one or two, you'll find them in stage three or four here in LA America. So what we developed is something that we saw in the region that was happening, this, uh, thing about moving cancer information from one place to the other. For example, if you have the suspicion that you have cancer, the first thing is to create a biopsy, uh, or, or to take a biopsy outta the tumor. And then you might take one day, two days analyzing the report, and then you have to wait for the patient to pick that report up and then take it to the physician so the physician can review it. And then this whole process takes 10 days. And then you start, you have the biopsy report and the physician says that he alarm. And now you have to the patient into the, as fast as possible. And that takes another days. So in the patient might have cancer and moment the patient is having the first went by. So what we created is, uh, pga an oncology information system that allows you to have everything that is connected to the patient's cancer suspicion in the same platform. And, uh, which, uh, first allows you the access to the information. Secondly, gives you all the alerts and warnings that, for example, a result is ready or a patient needs treatment at certain point. And third allows you to create statistics outta all information. Idea is to create, create this oncology information system that first allows you to control what's happening in the oncology institution. And second, and most importantly, is to connect all the dots. Then, uh, you have all the information that you need to make, uh, decision about the patient. So, uh, we started working in, in the first area that we touched was, uh, suspicion. Uh, we started working with, uh, screening protocols. Uh, the first one we launched, we launched in July, uh, July, 2020. In July, 2021, sorry. Uh, in, in Ecuador inka, we screened around 3000 women for human, uh, reported to the physician. The up on the infection that was found. This is high risk human virus. Uh, those patients are at risk of, uh, probabilities of developing, uh, cervical cancer. Um, we are also extending protocol to, you know, uh, in Latin America precursor, uh, lung cancer, uh, specifically in Chile. It's a very, very big problem due to contamination. And, um, then afterwards in the diagnosis and treatment phase, we created a platform called, uh, which allows physicians to, uh, remotely connect, uh, to discuss patient's, uh, case have all these, uh, assets, uh, in line for example, you have, uh, your mammographies or your immunology reports, your laboratory reports, your, um, anatomical path reports. If you have, uh, molecular screening of a patient, you have that available as well. So when you have that discussion, you have all the assets that you need, you create a treatment case or a treatment plan, and the platform administers the treatment plan and gives you warnings when this patient is supposed to have a chemotherapy or what is the, the expected date of the surgery for the patient. So it allows you to synchronize all the resources that you need to give attention to the patient. So, uh, in ensure, pretty much what we do is we collect all of that information and create a single pipeline, uh, to join the patient under care team in all of the patients, uh, uh, journey throughout cancer, hopefully, uh, joining them also in researching how they, uh, what result did they have from their treatment, and how that treatment will benefit a patient with the exact same type of cancer. So in the end, it's connecting enough information from a region that has 70% of that information in paper, uh, in order to create artificial intelligence that allows you to predict and prescribe the type of treatment for our patient, uh, a singular patient

Speaker 1: 14:58

Who pays for this platform. Who's your client? Yeah,

Speaker 2: 15:03

That, that's very interesting. We have, uh, different client, uh, we have a client and then we have an end user.

Speaker 1: 15:09

Exactly. Yeah, I imagine that mm-hmm.<affirmative>. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 15:12

Yeah. Um, currently we, most of our customers are, uh, pharma companies, uh, that are interested in conducting real data, real research. Uh, our biggest customer is we work Chile. Um, then, uh, with what we do with them is, uh, we created, uh, an r and d platform that allows, for example, a physician to interact with the patient, store that information. Then, uh, they send, uh, uh, consent form using the platform that is digital designed by the patient and allows their information to be used in clinical research. This is a completely automated, uh, process, and, uh, it gives the, the pharma, uh, a hassle free way to obtain high quality data to perform the research.

Speaker 1: 16:03

Absolutely. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. Yeah. So, so the, for the client, I'm sorry, for the end user, um, well, I, I, I, I take that back. So the platform is, is free or is easily accessible to a hospital, easily accessible to a, uh, a patient so that they can more freely enter the data because they are really the source of data. And then you sell that data to the pharmaceutical companies or whoever, industry

Speaker 2: 16:36

E Exactly. We sell aggregated, anonymized analytics of that information. Yeah. We never sell the source information. We actually don't, we don't have access to it. Um, whenever we enter the platform, it creates, uh, its, uh, encrypted. Uh, there are two keys that can uncorrect the information. The first one is from the physician, and the other one is from the patient themselves. Uh, so we don't have anything that can identify a person. Uh, we create our protocols using aggregated information, and that is an information that we use, for example, to train artificial intelligence. Well, we have an alliance with a company in Spain that's<inaudible>, uh, with a company. We're trading artificial intelligence algorithms to predict the best course of treatment for, uh, breast cancer. And, um, there are many other things that you can do. For example, if you introduce a new medication or a new chemotherapy treatment for certain types of cancer, you can validate the results in actual patients. Um, and that, that's, uh, the idea of, uh, having clinical information as a source of truth, and giving physicians also interfaces allow to create high quality clinical data, uh, instead of, uh, just writing things down in, uh, unstructured processable performance.

Speaker 1: 17:56

Yeah. But, but was the experience of the physician or the patient, uh, with the platform, because, uh, from the standpoint of a hospital or physician, don't they find this redundant to have to enter information in a electronic medical record platform, and then in your platform, I guess you're separate. How does it work? How's the adoption?

Speaker 2: 18:20

The, the platform works as an emr. Uh, an e uh, we, we have, like, we were actually discussing this, well, one of the, uh, this morning, uh, they say, you don't, Eva, there's no way you can evade, uh, doing like ehr, e R P software development. I said, no, because most of the, uh, clinics in America are still on paper. Uh, there's a study from the, the international telecommunications that says that Latin America has like 3% of their clinical information still on paper. So<laugh>,

Speaker 1: 18:54

Um, wow.

Speaker 2: 18:55

Yeah, case

Speaker 1: 18:56

Far. If

Speaker 2: 18:57

You wanna install, yeah, a beautiful tumor board that will allow you to discuss twice as much, uh, cases, twice as many cases, I'm sorry. And during the, the week, then, uh, you start seeing that for the Tmobile to work, you actually have to have digitized, uh, assets. So then you have to provide those physicians with some sort of, uh, tool to actually, uh, digitize the information. And then you have to install your, uh, his software. And then we, we started like working from the his, which is the base, and then we started adding like these cherries on top. Like for example, the tumor board, the screening platform. But you cannot have a screening platform or a tumor board if you don't have an, uh, so we have like two flavors. It depends on the institution. If they have a, is we create interfaces with their his to recover valid information to go into the tumor board. If you don't have a hip, no, a his, don't worry, we have you covered. And, uh, then we create an ecosystem for information to move in the clinic in a digital format.

Speaker 1: 20:06

Okay. So right now, tray is cancer. Are you looking, uh, does your roadmap include other indications or other therapeutic areas?

Speaker 2: 20:18

Yeah. Um, we currently are seeing the, uh, the space of chronic diseases in Latin America is the, in Africa as well is the least, the least inhabited, I'm sorry, by solutions, uh, because you don't have anyone that's integrating, uh, information in all of those spaces. Uh, we have had, um, proposals to, for example, this, uh, tuberculosis protocol, uh, respiratory diseases. There are, uh, prevalent in the region. Uh, we have had an invitation to do an Alzheimer long run test as well. Uh, so the, the space for chronic diseases is, uh, interesting. But the fact is that oncology is a very large niche in itself. And, uh, we see a huge impact opportunity, uh, oncology protocol.

Speaker 1: 21:08

Excellent. Very good. Congratulations. It looks like a thank you. A promise in technology or platform. And what countries are you currently in right now in Latin America?

Speaker 2: 21:19

We are operating in Chile. It's, uh, chiles, our headquarters. We are doing, uh, we're working inu, Dominican Republic. We have a, like three or four customers in Colombia. Uh, looking forward to expanding, uh, faster in Colombia. And we recently had interview with Primary care center in hon. They want to start using the platform, so probably gonna have a couple customers in Hons. Um, and, uh, then we're negotiating with our first customer in the us given that they have to, that takes a bit longer, but trying to have, we have few customers in many countries. The region, uh, every country that you see through is a, is a challenge because, uh, every country has different, uh, legislations. And then you have to make sure that you're not stepping anyone's sos.

Speaker 1: 22:20

Exactly. Yeah. Uh, the, that's the next question that I have for you, Luis. Challenges and best practices. Uh, can we identify some ch common challenges, uh, uh, among all these countries? I mean, across the board, have you seen kind of a partner of, uh, of, of accessing the market? Is it the language? Every country has a different kind of dialect in Spanish, different way of doing things, or same things, uh, as you correctly said, the, uh, legislation, the regulations are a little different in every country in Latin America, and that's a big challenge in the region is so fragmented, right? So please speak about challenges and, and if you can give us some tips or best practices, that'll be ideal.

Speaker 2: 23:08

Uh, that, that's great. Uh, that, that's a great question. I think, uh, the biggest challenge, as I said, is the difference in legisla legislations between the countries and, uh, the misconception that Latin America is a black country. Like, for example, you have, and, uh, like in, in Europe, and this is only recently, like 20 years from now, uh, in Europe, that you have a single, uh, entity that gives you access to the whole market. So in Latin America doesn't work like that. Every itself, every has their pattern terms of information and their, uh, legal framework. Uh, for example, um, when, in our case, one of the things that helped us, uh, penetrate countries faster is the fact that we cover, uh, legislation in, in the US that's called, it's, uh, extremely, extremely, uh, secure, one of the best legislations in the world for, for accounting on, on patient privacy. And, um, that makes it, whenever we go into a country, we have to learn like the, the key issues that we might find in the, the country's legislation. But it's usually faster and, and much easier to implement since we comply with this very, very demanding, uh, legislation. We also, we also comply with iso and in many countries, the of the law included for privacy control, uh, standard like a, a nine, 9,001. So if you comply with these, uh, international standards, it's going be a lot easier to respond to what the country is requiring from you. I would say the, the other large challenge is understanding the customer in each of those, uh, countries. They have different expectations, different technological development stages. And, uh, expecting, for example, a clinician from Chile to, uh, have the same level or, or the same awareness about technology as a clinician. Columbia is, it's very, very, is a severe understanding. Um, um, there, there's probably, uh, more, at least in the private sector here, some more awareness for, uh, healthcare, uh, technology and, and healthcare information technology in particular. You might have in, in Columbia, perhaps not in Bogota, but uh, in other cities of Colombia, or you might find, for example, example, I've been talking, uh, I've been talking recently with, uh, the healthcare ministry. Many other things that we're proposing to them are, are completely new. They didn't know that it could be done mm-hmm.<affirmative>. And it's super interesting in terms of, there's a huge amount of opportunities, but of course your sales cycle be a lot slower. Cause there's a huge education component in that, uh, sales cycle. So, uh, you have to say to people what they can expect, what is the result that they're going to get and, uh, uh, what is the, the type of revenue or the type of increase in efficiency that they'll get from implementing those type of technologies. Cause you have to tell them the whole story. Um, in, in many countries, I, I will guess that that encyclopedic knowledge is not necessary to, to be shared because people already have it. Um, here in Latin America, you have to start from scratch.

Speaker 1: 26:48

Hmm. Interesting. Alright. Alright. So Luis Yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 2: 26:55

No, no, I was going to say, if you are the guy that actually, uh, tells them the story for the first time, uh, then you are one step closer to, uh, getting the niche market, uh, specifically for you. Cause uh, yeah, you're the person that knows, uh, about it and you're gonna be the point of preference.

Speaker 1: 27:14

Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Alright. So any best practices, uh, any suggested, uh, tips or, or, uh, courses of action that companies can take when navigating these waters and all these countries? What would you say will be your muscles of, of wisdom? What would you say to somebody who's just starting to, uh, uh, think about Latin America as a place to do business based on your, your challenges and, and how, what you have done to overcome them?

Speaker 2: 27:41

Uh, I would say there are three things that you have to do first. Uh, get a, a close look of the market that you're entering. See if there's any local dominant, uh, driving force in the type of technology that you're trying to introduce to the market. Uh, seeing the stage of development that is also important. Uh, then when you get into the market, you have to know that latinamerican markets mo more on connection and less on value proposition. So, uh, get a first customer that's highly respected in that society or that country.

Speaker 1: 28:15

Mm-hmm.<affirmative> reference, create

Speaker 2: 28:17

Exactly. Create, uh, success cases. Uh, that's the most important thing to do. And you create that success case. Do not be shy in telling that person to introduce you who might to their circle, who are interested, who are interested in having their technology. Um, I, I would say there are some countries where, where you try to give that technology for yourself because it gives you competitive advantage. But in, in latinamerican countries, people are, are like super happy to show off, uh, how great their technology is. So that's something that you can take advantage of

Speaker 1: 28:55

Sure. Theirs.

Speaker 2: 28:57

Exactly. And saying let's share this huge success that we, people in your circle, I'll make you look good. And, uh, and, and it actually works. Who works super well.

Speaker 1: 29:11

Great sales tool. Yeah. Thank you for that tip. I mean, very nice. I like it.

Speaker 2: 29:15

No problem.

Speaker 1: 29:17

Alright, so Luis, work close to the end of the show. Uh, how can people get in touch with you?

Speaker 2: 29:22

You can reach us on our website, tei io. Uh, you can also write me my email, Luis santiago psi io. Uh, we have everything for your oncology needs, um, oncology information systems that can actually help you reduce, uh, the time that you take to diagnose and treat a patient behalf. Um, we're also probably going to be in some events that you might go to in the healthcare industry, so be on the lookout for us.

Speaker 1: 29:54

Excellent. You guys are active on LinkedIn, I'm sure, right?

Speaker 2: 29:57

Yeah, yeah. You can reach me. My LinkedIn profile's profile. We're active with both.

Speaker 1: 30:04

All right. Luis, thank you so much for being here. It's been a pleasure sharing this. Thank you, um, information with you. Uh, thank you for sharing your knowledge, your experience and your vision to dominate the oncology marketing Latin America exciting, uh, niche and prevalent that you're trying to, to solve. Congratulations,

Speaker 2: 30:23

<laugh>. Thank you very much. And and you too. I'm a fan. The podcast. Amazing. Well,

Speaker 1: 30:34

Thank you. Bye-Bye

Speaker 2: 30:36

Byebye.