Digital transformation in the pharmaceutical industry involves capitalizing on technology to develop and digitize a company’s operations. The pivotal role of these advancements is to embrace technology and bring more advantages out of it.
Typically, numerous companies invest a decade or longer in drug development, validation, and marketing. However, the emergence of COVID-19 during the pandemic catalyzed rapid mRNA vaccine development, showcasing the efficacy of digital tools in expediting processes. This has prompted the pharmaceutical industry to consider digital transformation, with around 55% of companies already incorporating digital technologies to varying degrees.
In this blog, we will learn how technology is transforming the pharmaceutical industry, its impact on the pharmaceutical market, and how digitization accelerates drug discovery.
What is digital transformation in the pharmaceutical industry?
Digital transformation in the pharmaceutical sector refers to upgrading applications, processes, and systems with emerging technology to optimize, improve, and revolutionize drug development, manufacturing, distribution, and patient care.
To understand the incorporation of digital adoption and the level of new technologies in pharma as per Deloitte, certain technologies are mainly adopted and integrated into the operations of pharma companies, with AI (38%), wearables (33%), data lakes (33%), and cloud (49%) leading adoption in day-to-day pharma operations.
Here are a few examples of digital transformation in the pharmaceutical industry:
- Quality with quality management system (QMS)
- Digitalization in clinical trials with e-clinical platforms
- Decisions informed by AI and ML
- Patient access and support programs on demand
- Utilize regulatory information management (RIM) systems to digitize regulatory approval processes and maintenance.
- Digital pills
- Data ops to scale data projects and analytics
How are technology and digitalization impacting the pharmaceutical industry?
Digital transformation offers many brilliant opportunities for the pharmaceutical industry to deliver significant processes that eliminate archived systems and long-standing manufacturing incompetence.
- It enables organizations to make informed decisions by enhancing their supply chain visibility. Thus, they can use these insights from their existing processes to improve their inefficiencies.
- Digital transformation can lower costs in the pharmaceutical industry through AI and machine learning communication. Therefore, these organizations can promote seamless manufacturing operations and automated corrective actions for better preventative maintenance.
- With the adoption of digital transformation, companies can increase their manufacturing productivity and efficiency. This allows businesses to collect data across all facilities, giving key insights into their overall operational efficiency.
- Digital capabilities would make quality managers’ jobs much more accessible, enhancing process improvements such as real-time data access and automatic reporting and eliminating reliance on paper-based documentation.
According to the current scenario, the pharmaceutical market encompasses businesses that develop and sell drugs and associated services. According to the global newswire report, the market is estimated to reach $1700.97 billion in 2025 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8%.
Acceleration of drug development through digitalization
Companies pursue breakthroughs to achieve successful conversions as research and development costs keep rising. Applying digital technology can reduce research costs, lower failure rates in clinical trials, and generate significant financial savings. Consequently, the digitalization of pharmaceutical companies will revolutionize traditional business models and enhance internal business operations. The incorporation of technologies such as robotic process automation will transform non-value-adding processes.
Conclusion
Pharmaceutical companies utilize digital health technologies to their benefit. However, to fully capitalize on digitization, they must acknowledge that they are transforming their business model. This shift necessitates the application of technology and a focus on a customer-centered approach.
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