Biopharmaceutical companies are making large digital investments aimed not just at operational improvements but also at establishing competitive advantage through evidence generation across the drug development life cycle, and the creation of digitally enhanced products. To gain real advantage, companies need to start considering digitisation as a core element of R&D strategy and address some of the current organisational barriers. These include multiple, overlapping initiatives that reduce the potential to establish platforms that can become more intelligent as data and applications evolve; lack of understanding by R&D teams of the opportunities, data sources and potential of techniques such as deep learning and robotic automation; and critical sourcing choices that drive the innovation agenda.
This paper presents an assessment of the critical strategic decisions that biopharmaceutical R&D organisations face as they seek to gain competitive advantage through investments in digital technologies.
