Examining the ELT, how many members come from Agilent, tied to Jacob’s network, or from similar industries like Thermo Fisher? These leaders failed to drive genomics growth in their previous roles and couldn’t deliver high growth at their former companies. Why expect them to succeed at Illumina? The board’s track record is concerning—approving the risky Grail acquisition, then yielding to activist pressure to divest it, a shortsighted move given Grail’s FDA approval projected for 2027. Appointing a CEO from a low-growth analytical industry, rather than an entrepreneurial innovator, further misaligns leadership with growth ambitions. Claims of high single-digit growth seem hollow; the CEO boasts of beating forecasts, but exceeding a no-growth baseline is hardly impressive. The ELT’s compensation, tied to these low expectations, is easily secured, while employees face layoffs and reduced pay, including lost equity grants. This is the new ELT’s legacy. Bring back Jay Flatley!
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Ahh I see yesterday's comment was deleted! Luckily, I screenshot it. It allegedly stated that Jakob W. "has a foul mouth about women and minorities"
What does he say about women and minorities???
If thats true, he should definitely be reported for that. Please don't stay silent.
No radical changes will happen. Just keep wasting money on those brown-nosers.
It will be 2 years in 2 months, so we can’t still say he is new but to be fair, 2025 with china, nhs and competition is not making it easy. However, the problem is I don’t see any clear vision or plan to deal with these challenges and revert back to growth. Optimizing efficiency and performance with negative motivation and rewards will take the company only so far. We need radical thinking and motivation to become the great company we once were. Taking away rsus, constant reorganization and zero job security is the opposite direction of what we should be doing. I hope we can find a balance to steady the ship while sailing forward instead of focusing on just staying afloat. I am pretty sure we still have great minds within our company who can find a way and solution for our situation. Illumina is so important of a company that cannot and should not fail.
Jacob is truly brave to take up the CEO role to turn around a company on a slippery slope down south.
Yes, his ELT team might not seem to be the 'A' team to some. But most importantly it is the team he has confident in making his mission a success.
Yet, again he needs time to prove his worth and surely he will. So let wish him and his ELT team all the best.
The amateur management not only sits at the elt level but all the way down into the regions. Getting rid of Nikki and Gretchen was a big mistake IMO.
Illumina is not a high growth company anymore. Selling sequencers and reagents has piqued in growth. Lowering ASPs coupled with a general decline in sequencing guarantees minimal growth. JT was hired to stabilize not grow.
I think most people underestimate how undesirable the ILMN CEO role was after Francis tanked the company and left a grease-fire requiring many brutal years to turn around the ship. No outstanding candidates wanted it, including Jay. Plus, he was dealing with health issues. I was underwhelmed with the choice of Jacob. But frankly, nobody great was going to take that role - or even if they might have wanted to, they had non-compete clauses in their existing arrangements. This is just another reason why I continue to say that despite Jacob being unspectacular, the blame for Illumina’s woes still principally rests with de Souza, as he ruined the innovation pipeline by getting distracted with other / lesser things, many of which were driven by his own fragile ego. The man (and his ineffective board) did $ billions worth of damage, and it’s going to take several more years for the company to get right, if it’s even possible at this point. Either way, it’ll never again be as great as it was during the Flatley heyday. Time to move on.
I imagine JF would have little interest in cleaning up a mess he didn’t make. If he was still interested in running the co. he never would have left. His mistake was his choice in succession. It seems like he took all the right steps in selection, onboarding, mentoring etc. Just goes to show how difficult and risky good succession planning can be.