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THE IMPORTANCE OF IT FOR THE PHARMACEUTICAL MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY

IT and the Pharmaceutical Industry

No matter what industry your business is in, information technology can be a powerful tool to enable collaboration, productivity and reliability. This is especially true for the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry. Businesses in this field need to be efficient, secure, reliable and compliant. As pharmaceuticals grow increasingly complex, IT solutions for pharmaceutical manufacturing are even more needed.
 
 
The iuvo Technologies team has a strong understanding of the needs of drug manufacturers because we’ve been providing information technology in both pharmaceutical and manufacturing environments for years. Our unique capabilities could help set your business on the path to growth and success.

 

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Why IT Services for Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Are Important

In the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry, there is a need for both scale and precision. Drugs need to be created following very specific formulations with tight tolerances for regulatory reasons. However, they also need to be produced in mass quantities to help the community at large and to be profitable. Therefore, businesses in this field need to have the right technology to get the job done quickly, accurately and efficiently.

 

From the computer systems holding drug product designs to the machinery producing the medicines, every aspect of pharmaceutical manufacturing operations is run by computers. Those systems need effective IT solutions to keep them secure and running. Any disruption in uptime can upset the whole process and threaten the business’s bottom line.

 

As manufacturing and pharmaceutical research both become more digitized, IT solutions for manufacturing drugs are becoming increasingly important. Furthermore, many pharmaceutical businesses need IT partners that know the industry well. The following are some of the benefits of having top-quality information technology in manufacturing and pharmaceutical settings.

Manufacturing businesses of all types can benefit from standardization, but this is specifically true for the pharmaceutical industry. With fewer variables in operations, it is easier to run efficiently and maximize machinery uptime. Good IT services can help to deploy flexible technology that can be adapted to the needs of different operations within the organization.

The right IT in manufacturing, particularly cloud technology, can help improve scalability. It allows new processes and resources to be spun up quickly. Plus, with the benefits of standardization, those new resources are predictable and familiar. Thus, organizations can add (or remove) capacity. Many pharmaceutical manufacturing businesses need this type of scalability because projects can go from small pilots to full-scale runs rapidly.

The pharmaceutical manufacturing industry is very competitive. You can’t afford to fall behind. Furthermore, tech-oriented brands such as IBM and Apple are moving into the healthcare space. To stay competitive, pharmaceutical manufacturers need to invest in technology that will allow them to not only be cutting-edge today but also to maintain that advantage in the future.

Delivering much-needed medicines to the community is one of the major goals of the pharmaceutical industry, so doing it quickly is a priority. With that in mind, technology and automation help make manufacturing enterprises significantly more productive. The digital era is helping businesses to measure and fine-tune their processes to reduce waste. Manufacturing managed services can help with maximizing operations uptime. These investments have major bottom-line impacts.

In a similar vein, it is essential for pharmaceutical manufacturing businesses to be able to reliably and consistently produce high-quality drugs. Moving to a cloud-based IT stack is a good way to improve the reliability of your IT solutions. When paired with a world-class MSP, your cloud technology can keep your business running smoothly no matter what.

The pharmaceutical industry is heavily driven by intellectual property and R&D. Therefore, it is essential for organizations to maintain excellent-quality security. Simply put, manufacturers cannot afford to have proprietary product formulations stolen. Using cloud solutions and working with an experienced MSP who can architect a secure solution will help businesses improve security.

The pharmaceutical industry is heavily regulated with different compliance requirements for different sales territories. Keeping track of these requirements and ensuring compliance can be a major undertaking. MSPs help offload some of this work within the IT space by deploying technologies that empower compliance.

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IT Challenges for the Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Industry

Although IT solutions for manufacturing industry businesses can provide significant benefits for pharmaceutical operations, the implementation of those solutions isn’t always simple. There are some unique challenges for IT and pharmaceutical industry manufacturers that need to be addressed. Fortunately, with a good managed services provider, these challenges can be overcome.

Higher Costs

The initial costs of creating drugs are extremely high. While companies can recoup by selling the drugs with minimal competition thanks to patents, the upside of this model is increasingly becoming squeezed by generic and biosimilar drugs. Thus, high efficiency in manufacturing these drugs is extremely important. Managed IT services for manufacturing need to be carefully optimized to help pharmaceutical companies to optimize their profitability.

 

Organized Records

Record-keeping in the pharmaceutical industry is critical to product development, quality assurance and regulatory compliance. However, the amount of data can be overwhelming without the right digital tools. From slow turnaround of analyses to data errors to quality control problems, businesses cannot afford to have inefficient or error-prone record solutions.

 

Other challenges include:

  • Risk of fraud by external partners or even internal teams
  • Rising competition
  • Demand driving the industry toward more complex products

These challenges create special requirements for any IT solutions used in the industry.

Important Stats About IT
and Pharmaceutical Manufacturing

Recent trends in pharmaceutical manufacturing paint a clear picture of the importance of highly effective IT solutions. Here are a few of the most important: 

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  • 98% of organizations indicate that a single hour of downtime would cost over $100,000. Without the right managed IT services for manufacturing, the pharmaceutical industry could experience severe costs caused by any downtime. 
  • Pharmaceutical company Merck lost an estimated $460 million due to a cyberattack.
  • Many pharmaceutical manufacturers significantly felt the impacts of disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. To combat this, many started to increase digitization and automation. More digital operations can increase efficiency, enable useful measurement (leading to even more improvements) and allow easier remote control of systems. 
  • Supply chain management and plant floor production operations tend to see the most benefits from digitization. 75% of pharmaceutical manufacturers indicate that additional automation would improve productivity, according to a 2019 survey.
  • Mantec projects that manufacturing companies will be 50% cloud-based by 2023. Cloud resources help pharmaceutical companies build out new capacity while maintaining consistency, centralization and security. The cloud helps them to overcome many of the unique industry challenges described above.
  • The growth rate of cloud computing in healthcare and pharma between 2018 and 2022 is believed to reach 21%. By 2030, the total cloud computing spend of the industry is expected to exceed $1 billion.
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Why iuvo Tech is the Best MSP for Boston Pharmaceutical Companies

iuvo Technologies has been serving the pharmaceutical and manufacturing industries in the Boston area since 2007. Our team members have extensive experience (many with more than 22 years in IT) and our case studies show a clear track record of achieving results for our clients. Much like the pharmaceutical industry, we care about the people we’re helping and want to ensure production happens efficiently and in a timely manner.

We understand the challenges that come with being a pharmaceutical manufacturing business. Whether you want an easy, hassle-free cloud migration, a thoughtful technology audit, white-glove on-site support or any other IT solutions, we are here to help. Our implementation of cloud for bioinformatics improves scalability. With the correct integration, companies enjoy an increase in productivity and getting to market faster through automated solutions. 

 

This commitment to our clients paired with our expertise has helped us to earn a net promoter score of 69, more than three times the average for managed service providers. With over 61,000 completed cases, one thing has remained true: we get results.

 
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The right IT solutions can help pharmaceutical manufacturing companies to improve consistency, become more scalable and accelerate the deployment of new processes.

Popular software for drug manufacturers includes ERP tools such as ProcessPro, BatchMaster ERP and ResponsePro. S2K Enterprise Software and Mar-Kov Chemical Management System are also popular.

The cloud can help manufacturing businesses roll out new products and processes, improve data collection and storage, comply with regulations and streamline technology spending.

In the biotech and pharmaceutical industry, much of the work is conducted in a lab and not remotely; therefore, onsite IT support is a major factor for productivity and efficiency. Uptime is a top priority in pharmaceutical manufacturing. With on-site assistance, businesses can ensure that their systems are running smoothly and effectively with greater consistency. It can also help with quickly addressing problems.

IT for manufacturing pharmaceuticals is essential. It can be used for developing new drugs, storing formulations, capturing testing data and generally keeping the business running smoothly. With the implementation of automated workflows, getting to market faster is guaranteed. 

New technologies are helping improve tolerances and unlock new pharmaceutical potential. This is helping to lead to lower costs, better medicines and more powerful R&D.

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Why iuvo Technologies?

iuvo Technologies’ understands the unique requirements of drug manufacturers, whether they're pertaining to cloud migration or co-managing IT. It shows in the work we do for clients and the value we add to their businesses. With our expansive knowledge and unique approach to IT, we can help pharmaceutical organizations handle the growing complexity of their cloud environment and broader tech stack.

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