Driving marketing success with a focus on people and trust – Interview with Nautilus Chief Marketing Officer Ken Suzuki

Ken Suzuki recently joined the Nautilus team as Chief Marketing Officer. He comes to us with over 24 years of experience at Agilent Technologies, an MBA from the Haas School of Business, formative work at Takeda, and a background in bioengineering. Ken’s decades of industry know-how combined with his deep appreciation for the power of trust-centered relationships will supercharge our ability to scale as we bring our novel proteome analysis platform to market.  

Read on to learn more about Ken’s extensive experience in the life sciences industry and discover how he’ll tap his expertise to drive Nautilus’ success. 

Developing frameworks that leverage diversity for insights into marketing and life 

I come from a family of artists and architects but was drawn to biology at a young age due to the field’s focus on creating frameworks that make sense of complexity. Growing up in New York City and traveling to Japan with my family, I was keenly familiar with the exciting diversity and tumultuousness of life. Yet, I was never daunted by it. Instead, it fascinated me. Frequent trips to the Hayden Planetarium and the Museum of Natural History reinforced my fascination and showed me that a deep appreciation for diversity enables one to find common and useful themes within it. 

Later, speaking with many customers from many countries while in my sales role at Takeda, I realized that people: 

• Are inherently good 
• Want to live peaceful lives with their friends and family 
• Want to succeed at the things they find enjoyable while doing something meaningful

The work of the marketer is to find the specifics behind these principles for any given person. Critically, people live up to these principles through experiences that engender trust and make them feel safe and confident in their decisions. Thus, to be a good marketer and human, it is not enough to find out what people want and present it to them. Instead, you must help people achieve success, continuously make them feel valued, and establish trust.

A relentless focus on people and trust drives Ken’s actions at Agilent

At Agilent I was able to put my thoughts about the importance of trusting relationships into action to grow the business. I prioritized making trust a core part of our internal initiatives and the basis for all external interactions.

Internally, I worked with the Agilent leadership to demonstrate that all members of the team had our respect, that we were genuinely interested in them and their ideas, and that we would be their champions. For example, the spectroscopy community had never seen an instrument like the ICP-QQQ Mass Spectrometer, but our marketing team presented a case for its utility and, far from ignoring them, we respected their keen understanding of customer needs and supported investment in the innovation. I became a strong advocate for the ICP-QQQ’s development and the had the privilege of spearheading its market introduction. Ultimately, it became a key part of Agilent’s portfolio thanks to the trusting relationships between leadership, R&D, and the marketing team.

Of course, the development of any product will involve internal challenges and disagreements, but focusing on the customer provides a way to navigate them. As leader of the Mass Spectrometry Division and of Enterprise Strategy at Agilent, my teams covered the gamut of marketing, R&D, sales, manufacturing, and more. They often had different priorities in terms of product requirements, processes, timelines, etc. Yet, they all trusted one another to prioritize the customer, and it was almost always possible to solve internal arguments by focusing on the opportunity and doing what served the customer best.

Externally, trust is best maintained by continuously reinforcing the idea that all members of the team share the goal of helping customers achieve success. Indeed, a focus on improving customer success drove many of my own activities at Agilent and especially my work establishing the Service and Support Marketing organization. This organization worked with members of R&D and services delivery to develop a core portfolio that helped customers best leverage Agilent products for their own work. We established these service offerings in constant communication with customers and always made it clear to internal team members what the customers hoped to get out of the service. As a result, our internal teams could see the impact of their work, and customers received the solutions they needed as efficiently as possible.  

The transition to Nautilus

I spent over 24 amazing years at Agilent developing trusting relationships that I believe vastly improved the lives of proteomics researchers. Nonetheless, this work was done at a well-established company. When I began hearing about Nautilus, I was enthralled by the opportunity to apply my focus on people and trust to develop something truly novel – a whole new way to do proteomics. 

Nautilus’ mission is to pursue deep, hard science that will ultimately impact the health of millions around the world. This aligns perfectly with my focus on people and trust. When I first began looking into Nautilus, I saw that this mission permeates every aspect of the company and was all but convinced to join the team. I was especially inspired by the Nautilus Platform’s potential to bring proteomics to people who cannot access it with current technologies. I truly believe our platform can drive a new era of discovery and better the lives of people all over the world. 

Excitement for the future of Nautilus 

I could not be more excited to be at Nautilus at this pivotal stage. We are getting ready to bring a novel technology to market, and I firmly believe we must apply people- and trust-focused frameworks to make our product launch a success. Grabbing people’s attention with a clear vision of how our platform will contribute to their success will enable us to develop the lasting, trust-centered relationships that unleash the platform’s potential. I will work tirelessly to reinforce the respect that exists between members of the Nautilus team and ensure we are always attentive to customer needs. By doing so, I believe we will become the most successful company in the proteomics space.