New Electronic and Web-based Applications, Sites, and Technologies
Featured Briefs: Tufts Institute Seeks to Increase Biopharma Partnerships Contracting Module Reduces Study Cycle Time In other technology news… E-UPGRADES AND ENHANCEMENTS The Tufts Institute for Biomedical Partnerships is a global initiative designed to create and manage a diverse portfolio of drug discovery and development partnerships. The Institute was developed and is managed by Tufts University School of Medicine and Tufts University’s advancement division. Founder and Chief Business Officer Lawrence Botticelli, Ph.D., says the Institute is focused on establishing a global brand for Tufts drug discovery and development expertise. These efforts include the recent launch of the Institute’s website, tuftspharmapartners.org. “Our objective is to form drug discovery and development alliances between Tufts and the pharma industry based on existing assets of strategic interest, while generating revenue streams to benefit the university and industry alike," Dr. Botticelli explains. The Institute’s interactive website, or “hub," functions as the Institute’s commercialization portal, communication vehicle, strategic market resource, and information repository. The site provides immediate access to almost 60 research activities driven by more than 50 participating faculty members with navigable information in more than 300 categories. { For more information, visit tuftspharmapartners.org. Trends: Alliances are becoming an essential strategy for life-sciences companies seeking to deliver novel therapeutics and cutting-edge technologies, as well as significantly extend current standards of care and clinical practice. Contracting Module Reduces Study Cycle Time Medidata Solutions has added a contracting module to its Grants Manager Web-based budgeting application that enables sites and sponsors to negotiate clinical trial site budgets directly online, eliminating the burden of managing hundreds of email messages and reducing budgeting cycle times. Through the contracting module, trial managers are able to monitor site negotiation status by study, by site, or across the portfolio in real time, bringing visibility to the process of site recruitment. Lori Shields, VP of Medidata’s data operations, says sponsors appreciate this visibility, which signals the need for intervention if negotiations begin slipping against the project timetable or forecasted budget. “The module represents a significant opportunity to accelerate site recruitment by automating the arduous and manual back-and-forth between sponsors and sites during the clinical trial budget negotiation process, allowing sponsors to move seamlessly from planned budget to finalized site costs in less time," Ms. Shields observes. { For more information, visit mdsol.com. In other technology news… Hubspan’s CUSTOMER INTEGRATION FOR BIOTECH solution allows life-sciences companies to extend all enterprise resource planning (ERP) and back-end systems across the business-to-business (B2B) cloud for seamless integration of key business processes such as e-commerce and e-procurement. The SaaS solution supports all major applications and data formats, and enables all members of an integration community to work from existing systems and business rules. Margaret Dawson, VP of marketing and product management, says the Customer Integration for Biotech solution leverages Hubspan’s B2B expertise to provide fast, cost-effective customer integration for life-sciences companies. “With most of the leading universities and research organizations already on our network, we can implement most B2B integration processes for our biotech clients within a matter of weeks," Ms. Dawson adds. { For more information, visit hubspan.com. Imperial’s NEW BRAND IDENTITY AND WEBSITE, imperialcrs.com, better reflects the global clinical research support organization’s growth strategy and focus on the life-sciences market. The new identity was developed to capture the essence of the life-sciences industry, with a green- and-blue color palette reflecting life and change, and arches that represent Imperial’s support of their customers throughout the research process. Imperial attributes recent growth in clinical research and trial support to its i WoRx solution, an integrated, flexible e-clinical process flow incorporating design, translation, production, and fulfillment. “By offering project management tools tailored to optimize site effectiveness and provide real-time information management to trial leaders, Imperial helps our clients improve study timelines and minimize risk," says Steve Swanson, VP and chief operating officer. { For more information, visit imperialcrs.com. d-Wise’s REVEAL Web-based search platform enables pharma company researchers, administrators, managers, and informatics directors to perform fast, comprehensive exploration of its clinical data systems. The Reveal solution reduces the time necessary to find clinical information from days to minutes in some cases, allowing critical questions to be answered quickly. One search can be executed across studies and document types to unlock meaningful information from data and save companies time and money. Once the results are returned, users can quickly pass those results on to existing data analysis tools or drill down into result details using the underlying data systems. { For more information, visit d-wise.com.
