The healthcare sector is under enormous cost pressure worldwide. Government interventions like the Inflation Reduction Act in the United States or the increase in manufacturer discounts in Germany are forcing pharmaceutical and biotech companies to adjust their cost structures in order to remain competitive. In addition to their R&D and portfolio strategy, companies must systematically analyze all areas of their value chains and production networks for potential savings without compromising their ability to act or innovate.

The traditional interaction between pharmaceutical companies, physicians, patients and specialist communities is undergoing radical change. New communication channels, the changing information behavior of digitally savvy patients and individualized forms of therapy are key drivers of patient-centered medicine. For many of the traditionally B2B-oriented companies in the pharmaceutical and biotech sector, this means a radical cultural change. To establish a mature, sustainable customer focus along the entire value chain, they must find ways to understand and evaluate patient behavior along the patient journey using meaningful data and to effectively align their business processes accordingly.

The use of artificial intelligence has the potential to change value-creation processes in the long term. From the discovery of promising drug candidates to the optimization of clinical trials and AI-supported diagnostic procedures, companies are already using artificial intelligence and other analytical methods to increase productivity and improve results along the entire value chain. To unlock the full potential of AI-based systems in the strictly regulated environment of the pharmaceutical and biotech industry, new regulations, processes, and procedures for implementation and validation need to be developed.

In the highly dynamic environment of the pharmaceutical and biotech industry, mergers and acquisitions are the norm. At the same time, new models of collaboration are emerging that are forcing the industry to rethink its approach to the entire end-to-end value chain – from strategic collaborations to joint ventures and ad hoc cooperation models. Against this backdrop, the ability to quickly integrate new acquisitions, markets and products and to make the resulting complexity manageable is becoming a decisive competitive factor.