WoW Woman in Wearable Tech I Tan Le, Founder & CEO of EMOTIV

Tan Le (BCom (Hon), LLB (Hon)) is the Founder & CEO of EMOTIV, a neuroinformatics company advancing understanding of the human brain using electroencephalography (EEG). She is a technology innovator, entrepreneur, business executive, and sought-after speaker.

EMOTIV's award-winning technology (Red Dot Award, AutoVision Innovations Award, Australian International Design Awards, Australian Engineering Excellence Awards) is a recognized world leader and pioneer in the field of mobile EEG & brain-computer interfaces with researchers in over 100 countries.

Tan is the recipient of numerous awards, including the prestigious 2018 Innovation Research Interchange (IRI) Achievement Award as a pioneering leader in the development of mobile EEG systems and in advancing understanding of the human brain; G'Day USA Global Innovation Awards, Advance Global Australian Award for ICT, AutoVision Innovations Award, Monash University Distinguished Alumni Award. She was named a National Geographic Emerging Explorer in 2013. She has been featured in the Who's Who in Australia list since 1999, Fast Company's Most Influential Women in Technology in 2010, and Forbes' 50 Names You Need to Know in 2011. She has also been an Ambassador for the Status of Women since 2001. Named Young Australian of the Year in 1998, Tan's story is featured in the National Museum of Australia. She was selected by the World Economic Forum as a Young Global Leader in 2009.

In 2018, a portrait of Tan was added to the permanent collection of the National Portrait Gallery of Australia – an honor bestowed upon prominent Australians whose life sets each apart as an individual of long-term public interest.

In September 2020, Tan was appointed to the Group Board of QBE Insurance, a general insurance and reinsurance company. QBE offers commercial, personal and specialty products and risk management solutions. QBE is listed on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) and employs more than 11,700 people in over 27 countries.

EMOTIV is the global leader in the field of scalable neuroinformatics. Its neurotechnology has been validated and included in over 4,000 publications and is currently in use by 80,000+ people in over 140 countries. EMOTIV’s trusted brainwear technology combines with the world’s largest and most diverse secure repository of human brain data for customized, science-based enterprise solutions. EMOTIV is headquartered in San Francisco, U.S.A., with operations in Sydney, Hanoi, and Ho Chi Minh City. To learn more, visit www.emotiv.com

Tell us a bit about your background and your projects so far.

I am a technology entrepreneur and business executive based in the Bay Area. I was born in Vietnam and escaped with my family after the Vietnam War in a boat, and spent three months in a refugee camp before landing in a suburb of Melbourne, Australia. As I grew up, I dedicated myself to academics and social activism – helping other refugees & migrants, and speaking out about social issues which my community and family faced daily. In 1998, I was recognized for my activism and awarded the Young Australian of the Year Award, which opened many doors for me. After one trip to the US, I moved here and haven’t looked back.

About ten years ago, I founded the neuroinformatics company EMOTIV, where I now serve as CEO. EMOTIV maintains the largest and most diverse, secure brain data repository on the planet, with a mission to continue to accelerate brain research globally. We want to empower individuals by helping them understand their own brains.

To date, EMOTIV’s non-invasive EEG brainwear technology has set a neuroscience standard and has been validated and included in over 4,000 scientific publications. In addition to its worldwide use by brain researchers, this year, we’ve worked with major organizations like Dell and JLL, on groundbreaking workplace wellness pilot programs and initiatives. 

How did you get into this industry? Has it been an easy industry to get into, or have you had many challenges?

Since childhood, I have always been interested in the human brain and wanted to understand its potential. I can vividly remember a conversation when I asked my mom why humans couldn’t yet move things with our minds. Perhaps I knew that one day I would help try to get us there.

All these years later, this goal to understand our brains still drives me every day. 

I am in this industry because I believe being free to harness the potential of one’s brain is a fundamental human right. When I first entered this field, it was clear that the tools that were available were prohibitively expensive for smaller institutions, let alone individuals. I knew this needed to change and that I could make an impact.

Our dream of democratizing access and unlocking the brain for 100% of the world's population required us to overcome challenges to make it more affordable. But we were committed to developing robust and mobile EEG systems at a fraction of the price of conventional EEG systems, and doing it without compromising on data quality. 

We learned important lessons encountering the same challenges that innovators and entrepreneurs in health tech are navigating today. How do you ensure that you’re creating a platform for good and empowering the end user? How are you safeguarding data, protecting privacy, and honoring individual data ownership?

How long did it take you to be where you are now? What was the biggest obstacle? What are the challenges of being in the industry you are in?

It’s taken ten years to reach a point where we feel our tech platform is mature. I think the hardest thing when building new frontier technology and inventing the future is the societal acceptance of what you’re doing and making sure people understand. In neurotech, we must overcome technological challenges, general consumer and societal acceptance, and ensure privacy and data security. We’re asking people to modify their behaviors too, which is always a challenge. With our technology, you wear something in relative proximity to the brain, which needs to be explained or it can be misconstrued. We need to be sure as an industry to adhere to high standards and convey them to the public.

The other challenge is controlling hype and exaggeration. At first, sometimes there’s a certain level of disbelief that EMOTIV’s technology can actually do what we tell them it can. On the other hand, once new partners see it in action, they go to the other extreme, and may even leap to the conclusion that EMOTIV can read minds – but we can’t and won’t ever try to. There’s a balance we have to strike as we raise awareness about this exciting new frontier that we are enabling. 

What are your most significant achievements to date?

We succeeded in lowering the cost of brain research, delivering a product that costs a fraction of the cost of conventional EEG systems. We also have built a data platform with a massive amount of real-world data that are longitudinal, geographically and demographically diverse, and representative. With access to a high-quality data trove of ethically collected brain data from non-invasive, wearable devices that measure across many unique use cases, researchers are using machine learning models with the data to help people finally understand the brain. 

What’s more, I can now move objects with my mind – and you can too!  With our tech, we can help people move things with their minds, monitor their own cognitive levels, and better understand the human experience.

We have built a grassroots movement around the democratization of brain research. We’ve made it possible to take a clinical research-quality machine out of the lab and into the real world, critical for understanding how the human brain really works. Over 17,000 Google Scholar articles reference EMOTIV’s technology platform, more than all other wireless EEG data sources combined.

But my biggest achievement of all is my little munchkin, my daughter! Every day I look at her and am amazed by how she’s taking in the world around her. Nothing is more fulfilling than seeing her learning at every moment. She’s pretty amazing. 

What are the projects you are currently working on?

While most of the projects we’re currently working on are proprietary, I can happily share a few that we have been working on over the past year or so. 

Right now, we are part of a groundbreaking partnership with L’Oreal’s Technology Incubator, and luxury brand Yves Saint Laurent (YSL), to interpret what the brain senses when we smell a fragrance. Using one of our neurotech devices in-store, consumers’ EEG is measured in response to several YSL scents and analyzed by a patented emotion algorithm to provide personalized fragrance advice. 

We’ve also begun working with JLL on workplace wellness research. With this international commercial real estate leader, we looked into factors like the best environment for creative tasks, how working together affects attention and stress, and what situations create collaborative energy. The JLL program and results are being shared as part of a series with the Wall Street Journal, and you can read the first one here. 

Another workplace wellness tech partner of ours is DELL, who, in 2020, worked with us to study the impact of well-functioning, updated hardware, and tech on the employee experience. The study’s cognitive data showed us that lousy tech experiences like outdated hardware and software caused people twice as much stress as their peers who had upgraded and efficient computer equipment. This definitive data led Dell to prioritize investment in laptop upgrades for their employees. 

 While I can’t talk about everything we have going on right now, I encourage you to keep following our journey for more updates. 

 Is the #WomenInTech movement important to you, and if yes, why?

Of course – And especially now that I’m a mom to a girl. The #WomeninTech movement has been very important to me. 

I deeply believe that we must start getting our girls comfortable with STEM as early as possible. For the women currently in tech, we need to foster possibilities and provide more examples of women doing non-traditional work because our little girls are watching us. We don’t want them thinking, “Mom, I can’t do this–” just because they aren’t seeing women in STEM jobs. More ladies in STEM showing up in girls’ daily lives and in the media lets them know they can do these things too. 

Today’s world is being redefined and shaped by technology, and it’s certainly not an easy industry for women to navigate right now. While there may be some stand-out individuals that have earned success in tech as a woman, our numbers remain very small statistically speaking. If we want women to feel comfortable in this industry, we need to do a lot more to not only ensure that women first get into tech talent pipelines but that we can also migrate them to leadership positions and help them thrive throughout their careers.

For example, if they want to take a few years to have a baby and do what they need to in their life, we as an industry must support that. Women’s bodies are different. We can do different things; we can do more than men! To show this, we have to support and maintain other women’s contributions to the workforce by changing that lens within ourselves and elevating others. 

What will be the key trends in your industry in the next five years, and where do you see them heading?

For me, the main thing I anticipate is neurotech becoming a lot more commonplace and more embedded and ubiquitous in how we conduct our lives, whether at home or work. While to outsiders, EMOTIV may still seem like new technology, in the broader world of wearables, everyone is wearing something that has a biosensor. Mark my words – brain biosensing for better health and understanding will follow a very similar trajectory over the next five years to that of the FitBit or Apple Watch. 

I am even starting to notice neuroscience and behavioral science terms woven into popular apps like TikTok and Instagram. Regular, everyday people are starting to care more about understanding the psychology behind why they are doing something. We want to know the motivation behind our actions and thoughts and become healthier in the process. 

What is the most important piece of advice you could give to anyone who wants to start a career in this industry?

The main thing I advise anyone wanting to join tech is to start with the fundamentals. Get familiar with the space you want to be in. Learn about it and find something you’re overly excited about. You don’t want to just jump into anything unless you believe in its trajectory and future. 

Secondly, it’s important to identify why you want to do something. For me, it’s less about what you do and more about why you’re doing it and digging deeper. Then, once you have a clear view of why you want to work in this career and this industry, it’s more likely that you’ll be able to overcome any knockbacks or challenges that you may face along the way. 

My advice? Never stop thinking about the why.

Who are three inspirational women in your respective industry you admire?

For me, the first person that comes to mind is Sam De Brouwer, Chief Strategy Officer at Sharecare, who I know personally and who is terrific. I admire her entrepreneurial spirit! The resilience she’s shown in our industry and her desire to positively impact the health industry is unmatched. She’s also a wonderful mom!

Another person I deeply admire is Lila Ibrahim, a computer scientist and Chief Operating Officer at DeepMind. We share a connection as mothers. While she’s not working in a technical role anymore, she was the first business executive brought onto the DeepMind team, and is leading this industry in many ways. I am excited to see Lila talk about their work in driving advancements in AI alongside the ethical considerations that need to be in place to drive the industry forward. 

Lastly is Katrin Amunts, of whom I am a big fan from afar. Katrin is a neuroscientist and Professor of the C. and O. Vogt Institute for Brain Research at the University of Dusseldorf and Director of the Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine in INM-1 in Forschungszentrum Jülich. She is a superstar! She’s been at the helm of a human brain initiative called the Human Brain Project. To me, she’s inspiring not only because she is an unparalleled expert in the field of neuroscience but she is one of the best out there in communicating to the world how her work can impact humanity as a whole, which is what we need to further our goal of demystifying the human brain for each individual on earth.

Find out more about EMOTIV on their website.

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This interview was conducted by Marija Butkovic, Digital Marketing and PR strategist, founder, and CEO of Women of Wearables. She regularly writes and speaks on topics of wearable tech, fashion tech, IoT, entrepreneurship, and diversity. Follow Marija on Twitter @MarijaButkovic and read her stories for Forbes here.