Big Data in Transforming Supply Chain In Pharmaceutical Industry

Looking back, one can notice that the pharmaceutical industry has always been quite slow in adopting new technologies. This is because the pharmaceutical sector has faced a lot of hurdles in terms of regulations and compliance which makes the whole process much more difficult.

But despite all the obstacles, this industry has adopted modern technologies like Artificial Intelligence, the Internet of Things, and Machine Learning, along with Blockchain which is playing a very big role in transforming the entire supply chain process within this industry.

How does each of these technologies influence the pharmaceutical industry? Let us explore find it out below.

IoT or Internet of Things is mainly used for cold chain monitoring in the pharma industry. It is very important to have a proper operation cold chain or else patients might start receiving unsafe products. IoT sensors help in temperature checking and protecting the cold chain. Along with this, the technology also helps in preserving the efficacy and safety of its products. IoT also helps in eliminating human errors along with enhancing real-time transparency, which in turn reduces undesirable costs that are associated with product losses.

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

Just like data science has helped in the growth of other industries, it also has tremendous potential when it comes to the pharma industry. AI takes into account predictive analytics while ML helps in transforming the pharma supply chain. This enables adoption of a more intuitive and data-driven approach in the pharmaceutical supply chain management.

With an increase in visibility factors, companies will be able to equip themselves to manage the business proactively. They will be able to predict issues that might occur and can also take protective measures against the same. The supply chain of pharma companies needs to use both these technologies to manage their inventories and medicine availability. The data will help them make quick decisions and as a result, it will help the patients to get their drugs on time. This will also reduce those costs that are generally associated with huge disruptions.

Blockchain Technology

Blockchain is a highly encrypted, secure and immutable ledger. This itself can be of immense help in certain things that are operated by the pharma industry. Firstly, companies need to understand that they should employ this technology in such places where it will not violate the primary rules of Blockchain. Things like pricing and patient data are ideally not very well-suited for the Blockchain user case. On the other hand, Blockchain is really good when used for situations where parties need regular communications. This technology will protect the communications with its high integrity level.

The pharmaceutical industry might have been slow in adapting to different advanced technologies, but slowly and steadily it is also undergoing an inherent digital transformation. Stakeholders have now understood that these technologies are essentially helping the pharma industry to grow in various ways. The most important thing is that it has helped in increasing the confidence of the customer and has also lowered costs borne by companies due to errors.