The Architect of J&J's Breakup Bets on Tech for the Future of Drugs
Joaquin Duato helped mastermind the health giant's breakup. As he takes the reins, he'll need to convince skeptics on Wall Street his pursuit of tech-industry luster goes far enough.
Joaquin Duato is surrounded by relics of the past. Behind him are 19th century baby soaps, 100-year-old Band-Aids, and other timeworn products that made Johnson & Johnson into a household name. But the new chief executive officer isn’t interested in artifacts. If he doesn't abandon tradition for innovation, “we will be left behind,” he says. “That’s my number one concern.”
On the edge of Johnson & Johnson’s New Brunswick, New Jersey campus, Duato is giving his first sit-down interview from within the company’s oldest building, which once produced energy for its factories. Now it’s a museum parading J&J’s 136-year heritage. There is no bigger or better known health-care conglomerate in the world. Yet Duato plotted to rid it of its consumer-products legacy.