PTE: Many companies are seeking additional outsourcing work beyond traditional research and development and manufacturing.
What additional capabilities are you being asked about by potential clients?
Sambasivan: In light of current industry challenges, such as the impact of patent expiries and increasingly stringent price control measures,
many pharmaceutical companies have undertaken a complete review of their overall business and outsourcing strategy. Companies
now expect their outsourcing partners to not only help drive efficiency in business and IT operations, but also to aid in
large-scale, long-term transformation and innovation to enable business growth and agility. These factors are also becoming
increasingly important as companies seek to move into emerging markets where price competition is higher, necessitating new
business and pricing strategies that can quickly adapt to changing conditions. As a result, there is an expectation that partners
bring end-to-end capabilities and services across business processes by bundling technology and platforms together (known
as BPaaS or Business Process as a Service) in both clinical and commercial operations.
PTE: In what business areas of a pharmaceutical company’s operations do you think social, mobile and cloud technologies can
most effectively be implemented?
Sambasivan: Social media has exposed pharmaceutical companies to a new risks and opportunities. Social media is primarily being used in
the pharmaceutical industry to develop better connections with patients and physicians, recruit patients and track and report
adverse events. However, the level of adoption and maturity in the implementation of social media is relatively low in the
pharmaceutical industry because of various factors, particularly the challenging regulatory environment in which the industry
operates. Despite the difficulties, several pharmaceutical companies are now broadening the way they use social media. For
instance, as well as using platforms like Twitter and Facebook for distributing press releases and other company announcements,
companies are also using them to promote awareness of health issues and diseases, manage corporate affairs, share corporate
social responsibility initiatives and engage with customers in real-time. In sales and marketing, social media can be used
to explore unmet medical needs, drive campaign effectiveness, facilitate brand management and brand reputation monitoring,
and build customer loyalty through communities and portals.
Many pharmaceutical companies are also promoting crowd sourcing to drive innovation by asking patients, physicians, partners
and other external organisations to come up with ideas to address business problems and issues through their websites and
other social media channels. Readers can learn more about this at
http://www.PharmTech.com/Sambasivan.
Mobility is currently at the top of business and IT initiatives because devices such as tablets and smart phones are seeing
significant uptake. In addition, mobility is beginning to have a great impact in driving end-user productivity and agility,
as adoption increases across the pharmaceutical value chain, particularly in sales, marketing, and in clinical and healthcare
development functions. Some examples of the adoption of mobile devices, platforms and technologies include remote calibration
of laboratory information management systems, clinical trial monitoring visit scheduling and reporting, multimedia e-detailing,
mobile business intelligence, mobile customer relationship management, field rep self-education and patient health remote
monitoring.
As pharmaceutical companies move towards the business model of a networked company, which comprises an ecosystem of partners,
providers, payers, pharmacies and other external research organisations, the need to share information and collaborate becomes
paramount. Cloud computing and related technologies play a huge role in provisioning scalable and flexible infrastructure
and enable pharmaceutical companies to meet increasing demands, whilst adhering to cost pressures.
PTE: How are new technologies, such as social media, mobile technologies and cloud computing, being adapted into the offerings
of outsourcing providers?
Sambasivan: The unique challenge with new technologies is the speed at which they are changing. What was new six months ago is no longer
new now. Most outsourcing providers have dedicated technology centres where they prototype and incubate new technologies,
solutions and innovation models through small teams, which examine specific business challenges and seek to design solutions
that may potentially have a transformational impact. Once prototyped and tested, these solutions are piloted in the market
and, if successful, are funded to become a business solution that can be scaled and adapted to meet customer requirements.
The key, however, is to combine the power of these new technologies with the right business capabilities to create appropriate
outsourcing solutions. As a result, many have instituted focused user groups, communities and customer advisory panels to
obtain continuous feedback on relevance and applicability of these new technologies as they change, and as business environments
change.
Pharmaceutical companies are taking a cautious approach towards adopting new technologies, including social media and other
technologies such as mobility and cloud computing. Although the promise is there, companies are reluctant to make large-scale
investments at the enterprise level due to many questions regarding security, privacy, regulations, scalability and return
of investment. Many prefer to work with their outsourcing partners to pilot and scale slowly.
