Health Tech: Piotr Zając On How Untitled Kingdom’s Technology Can Make An Important Impact On Our Overall Wellness

An Interview With Dave Philistin

Find your reset button. — Building products that change the world is challenging just as much as addictive. It can draw you in completely and leave you with no sense of the outside world. I reset when I go diving or take long walks with my dog Argus. I turn my thoughts off and focus on the here and now. No phone or smartwatch around. I focus on my breathing and on the way I move. Reset, and you’ll find yourself with much more energy.

In recent years, Big Tech has gotten a bad rep. But of course, many tech companies are doing important work making monumental positive changes to society, health, and the environment. To highlight these, we started a new interview series about “Technology Making An Important Positive Social Impact”. We are interviewing leaders of tech companies who are creating or have created a tech product that is helping to make a positive change in people’s lives or the environment. As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Piotr Zając, CEO of Untitled Kingdom — medical software development company.

Piotr Zając is the CEO of Untitled Kingdom, a software & product development company founded in 2008, specializing in digital health, IoT & FemTech projects. Professionally, Piotr is the guardian of Untitled Kingdom’s mission to positively impact users’ lives. Privately, he’s a music connoisseur who ​​just completed his term as President of the Wieniawa Community Band; a new father, a happy husband, and dog owner of a Polish greyhound named Argus.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series. Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood backstory and how you grew up?

Sure! I grew up in Poland in the wake of the Revolutions of 1989. Yet, as I saw my parents challenged by the system, I also saw a great example of how to become a self-made person.

My father ran his own business, so I always saw him working long hours and managing other people. It showed me how to be resourceful and business-savvy. In comparison, my mother taught me how to be empathetic and recognize the best in every human being. This deadly mix resulted in an 18-year old politically active scout who wanted to change the world.

I blame my upbringing and my parents’ support for my entrepreneurial spirit.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

That would be Steve Zadesky, who worked in Apple as Vice President of Engineering, recommending the Untitled Kingdom team as a great partner to another prolific company. I hadn’t met him at the time, yet he’s responsible for one of my most relevant business relationships. We met face to face weeks after.

As a European, I find the American style of networking mind-blowing — in the best way possible! In the US, on a huge scale, people are always ready to listen, acknowledge the experience of another human being, and make things happen.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

It’s a boring answer, but it’s true: it’s every person who has ever joined Untitled Kingdom. And I mean it. As a CEO and, well, a leader of the whole team, I learn a valuable lesson from every team member. They come from different backgrounds, and I’m always glad when they share their points of view.

I cannot always be the smartest person in the room, so I’m happy to learn by listening to others.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

A person’s freedom ends where another man’s freedom begins — a quote credited to Alexis de Tocqueville and Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, and Abraham Lincoln (among others).

This very simple sentence is my beacon. It applies to a variety of things in my professional and private life. It carried me through university, through working on Untitled Kingdom projects and my relationships.

You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

It’s a wild bunch of personal traits, but here it goes:

Peace and patience.

When the final stages of negotiations are going awry, I tend to stay calm. When key UK citizens leave to chase other opportunities, I’m focused on looking for solutions. And I never (ever!) make a big decision when I’m emotional.

Empathy. I’m strongly in tune with other people’s emotions. And it’s beneficial in at least 2 ways.

For one, it allows me to make Untitled Kingdom a fantastic place to work. I’m physically and psychologically unable to be one of these ruthless, mean bosses you hear about in successful IT companies.

It also allows me to read the room easily. Be it in-person or online. I know how to carry the conversation and mediate between both sides. When working with our partners, Untitled Kingdom advocates for the end-users of each medical device. It can lead to some heated discussions.

My love for gadgets.

I’m certain that my deep need to explore new and better ideas will end me. But I do enjoy being up-to-date with new technology and with (hardcover!) books — waaay too much.

There are moments when people need to stop me. “No more new ideas — we’re doing it this way.” “No more talking about the WWDC updates.” “No more bringing new books for everyone at the business meetings.”

Ok super. Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion about the tech tools that you are helping to create that can make a positive impact on our wellness. To begin, which particular problems are you aiming to solve?

They come in different forms, but often they boil down to 2 things: inequality and lack of accessibility.

It’s about time technology allowed us equal access to diagnostics and medical treatments. Whether you live in New York City or, let’s say, a small city in Texas, why shouldn’t you have equal access to your trusted doctor? If you’re living with a disability, why shouldn’t the same technology available to maximize big companies’ profits also improve your day-to-day experience?

It’s more than convenience. Providing more health data means more accurate diagnostics, and better living conditions for the disabled means breaking the stigma and social barriers.

How do you think your company can address this?

That goal requires a lot of work, and the greatest never do it alone. Untitled Kingdom does not produce any medical devices; we work with partners who do. We share the work and responsibility required to bring reliable solutions to patients and end-users.

So in many ways, it’s about what problems we solve for our partners. We’re bringing them peace of mind and translating their domain expertise into building software. Plus, we’re freeing them from the technological burden, so they can focus less on building their product and more on building business.

We’re experts in building reliable software for the medical certification process. So we dedicate time to deliver as well as learn, to collaborate as well as review. Plus, we’re always mindful of accuracy, usability, accessibility, and data privacy.

Can you tell us the backstory about what inspired you to originally feel passionate about this cause?

Well, there was one specific moment in the company’s history when we needed to choose: do we stick to our values, or do we pursue the profit and engage with a project that is extremely harmful to the environment?

The year was 2017, and the morale across all Untitled Kingdom citizens had hit an all-time low. We had no projects to work on and struggled to keep everyone in the company. The prospect of that new project was more than tempting. It was complex and exciting in terms of technology. Plus, it meant steady income and (paradoxically) could bring us good publicity. A perfect project — if it wasn’t extremely damaging for the environment.

I had a long walk by the Vistula river. I was on my own, but the decision I would make would represent the whole company. And a quick realization hit me: your values are not for sale. We passed on that offer. A few months later, we were given a chance to work on an exciting digital health project.

I was always passionate about changing the world, but that’s when I decided to put it in business terms and to aim to attract projects and business owners who think in the same way.

How do you think this might change the world?

Step by step and little by little. It’s not about one person or one institution bringing a big change. It’s each and every one of us making small changes and putting a stop to what is harmful.

The partners we work with and our projects are easily the best part of working in Untitled Kingdom. It’s the reason why we keep getting up in the morning.

With Eargo, a virtually invisible high sound quality hearing aid, we know we’re putting a stop to stigmatizing people with hearing loss and giving them more control over their lives.

And with Elvie Pump, the world’s first wireless, wearable, silent, and smart breast pump, women can be themselves — always and everywhere — and feel more freedom regardless of the outcome of the process of bringing another human into the world.

Step by step, these devices change the world by challenging the way people think and by undoing the harm that outdated social norms caused us in the first place.

Keeping “Black Mirror” and the “Law of Unintended Consequences” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks about this technology that people should think more deeply about?

When mentioning the potential drawbacks in HealthTech, the most popular example is the use of AI and the importance of data privacy. But it’s bigger than that.

In many ways, it brings me back to the quote I mentioned earlier — A person’s freedom ends where another man’s freedom begins. Health is and always will be an intimate matter. Any solution concerning it needs to be approached carefully and with care. Nowadays, pandemic-driven technology is racing to find the next big solution and to improve people’s lives. But we cannot forget about the diversity and complexity of other human beings or their freedom, preferences, and choices.

Here is the main question for our discussion. Based on your experience and success, can you please share “Five things you need to know to successfully create technology that can make a positive social impact”? (Please share a story or an example, for each.)

Some of this will sound cliché, but it’s worth keeping in mind, nonetheless.

Explore beyond your comfort zone, in thought, in action, and in your research.

When thinking of technology, we tend to think of big cities, looking at it from the place of our own struggles, our own environment. We shouldn’t. It’s also small towns, central states, Eastern Europe, and a small village in Provence.

This also means learning from the industry’s faults, like last year’s examination on sources of inaccuracy in wearable optical heart rate sensors — where medical-grade wearables changed their activity in relation to the skin tone of a person wearing them.

Do not compromise on consistency. Your beliefs and actions do translate into reliable products. Stick to your principles and the level of quality you aim to deliver, even when the system puts cynics and opportunists forward, as shown by the recent case of Theranos.

Learn how to get others passionate about what you are passionate about. It’s the key to bringing people on board to realize your big idea.

I mentioned the period when Untitled Kingdom struggled to attract a new project. I didn’t know at the time that while I was taking these walks on my own, coming home all nervous and sweaty, the rest of the team was planning the next months for the company.

In the office, altogether, we were working hard to pull the company out of the sales slump. But after working hours, when I went home, the rest of the team simply moved to a café nearby and continued working without me — sitting up late and brainstorming ideas. Even when I didn’t fully realize it, I had my team’s support!

Read the classics. It may sound foolish, but to make a positive social impact, you need to understand social dynamics.

Books like Crime and Punishment or The Master and Margarita build and rebuild your moral code and tackle ethical issues that came way before us. Business publications are important, but they’re mostly about our actions, not the place where these actions should be coming from.

Find your reset button.

Building products that change the world is challenging just as much as addictive. It can draw you in completely and leave you with no sense of the outside world.

I reset when I go diving or take long walks with my dog Argus. I turn my thoughts off and focus on the here and now. No phone or smartwatch around. I focus on my breathing and on the way I move. Reset, and you’ll find yourself with much more energy.

If you could tell other young people one thing about why they should consider making a positive impact on our environment or society, like you, what would you tell them?

I would say one simple thing: think of generations to come.

It may be just me recently becoming a father, but your understanding of the world changes when you hold a newborn in your arms. You feel a certain obligation to leave the world behind just as you left it, if not in a better condition.

It’s a history and obligation taught and passed to us by previous generations. Our grandparents fought for us (in Poland, very vividly, for freedom and democracy), not knowing the outcome. We should repay the debt and fight for the next generations, and they will fight for the generations to come. It’s world history.

Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would like to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. :-)

Since Napoleon Bonaparte is no longer among us, the first person that came to my mind is Sir Jonathan Ive, who ​​worked as a Chief Design Officer in Apple. Beyond his work with Apple, I admire him as an industrial and product designer, for his mastery as well as his ​​minimalist and downplayed sense of style.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

At www.untitledkingdom.com and my personal LinkedIn profile: www.linkedin.com/in/zajacp

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational, and we wish you continued success in your important work.