AstraZeneca's Bob Li on the MARS mission to eliminate cancer

Welcome to Eureka, the McKinsey podcast exploring how healthcare innovation becomes real world impact, where evidence, practice change and leadership meet to improve patient outcomes.

I'm Nav, your host.

I'm your other co-host, Anas, and each episode will be joined by clinicians, scientists, and industry leaders working at the front edge of change to unpack how progress really happens, where breakthroughs stall, where they scale, and what has to shift in decision-making, collaboration, and execution if we want innovation to truly improve outcomes.

Today, we're joined by Dr.

Bob Lee, Global Head of Oncology, Medical Affairs at AstraZeneca.

Bob's a physician scientist who's worked across clinical care, academia and industry with a single true light, putting patients first and expanding access to the innovations that can change outcomes.

AstraZeneca has bold ambitions in oncology and is pushing a patient-centric and long-horizon ambition, a Mars mission mindset.

And we'll be hearing about that shortly.

They're also leaning into companion trials, AI-enabled computational pathology, and new ways to broaden trial access beyond major AMCs or academic medical centers.

We'll unpack what that looks like in practice for clinicians and patients.

Bob, welcome.

Great to have you with us.

Thanks, Nav.

Thanks, Anas.

It's great to be here.

Thanks

for the opportunity,

for a good chat.