The pharmaceutical industry is going through a digital transformation by adopting disruptive technologies. 

Digital transformation is shaping the economy by introducing disruptive innovations. Technologies like AI, blockchain, and IoT play a pivotal role in enhancing the growth and efficiency of many industries and pharma is one of them. The pharmaceutical industry has received huge benefits by embracing disruptive technologies. The Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis was recently in the reports as they integrated AI and data science into drug discovery by collaborating with Microsoft and AWS. 

Different cutting-edge technologies are creating an impact and driving the growth of the pharma industry. Let us ponder on some of those top technologies and understand their role in the industry. 

AI Pioneering Revolutionary Changes 

We witnessed how AI and machine learning aided the Covid-19 drug development by identifying protein structures and analyzing the target patients for the drug test. AI and machine learning are already impacting the healthcare industry with their exceptional data analytics and predictive analytics capabilities. AI helps the pharma industry by enhancing R&D and analyzing patterns in data sets to understand the implications, benefits, and success rates of new drugs. 

A report by Grand View Research revealed that the global AI in the Healthcare market size is expected to reach USD 31.3 billion by 2025, growing at a CAGR of 41.5% over the forecast period. AI and machine learning is a strong contributor in storing patient data also known as electronic health records and allowing enhanced diagnosis. 

‘Around the Pill’ Digital medicine

The realization of the significance of delivering a complete medical package paved the way towards the development of the ‘around the pill’ strategy. This concept aims to change the experience around the medicines and enhance it by offering a digital package. Rather than just developing and selling drugs, pharma companies are now focused on providing digital devices and health apps to improve the customer experience. With healthcare apps and information about the medicines readily available and accessible, patients will feel more connected to the service unlike just consuming the medicine with a tailored prescription. Manufacturing multi-layered pills using 3D technology is also a development aimed at improving medication management by patients. 

Cloud for Operational Efficiency 

The Pharma industry is supplied with abundant data from different networks and devices. Cloud is the ideal solution for optimizing the resources to analyze and store data. Cloud provides a scalable platform that can be customized according to the industry demands. 

Cloud computing is a cost-efficient method that the pharmaceutical industry can leverage to gain great data accessibility and analytics. Cloud offers a safe ecosystem for data and has been proven to aid clinical trials by simplifying complex data analytics. They also offer web and social listening tools to gain feedback during clinical trials. 

Precision medicine 

Drugs react differently in different patients and precision medicine addresses this by providing personalized treatments. Targeted development of drugs to suit specific genes or people is known to help pharma companies in getting in-depth knowledge about diseases and their treatments. The emergence of biomarkers for identifying tumors and developing drugs according to the precise diagnosis is a revolutionary step towards treating cancer. 

Natural language Processing plays a pivotal role in developing precision medicine. This technology enables pharma companies to extract phenotypic factors from electronic health records and identify disease variants. 

The Evolving Blockchain Trend

Blockchain uses distributed ledger technology to enhance transparency and traceability. Using decentralized blockchain technology can aid pharma companies in identifying counterfeit medicines and categorize them without third-party involvement.
Streamlining supply chain management is another sector where pharma can leverage blockchain. It increases visibility and ensures compliance with various regulations since blockchain is immutable and secure. Tracking drug distribution and details about various medicines is another use case of blockchain in the pharmaceutical industry.