Featuring an article by Nicholas Basta, the Editor in Chief, Managing Partner and Founder of Pharmaceutical Commerce!

When it comes to safely and securely transporting high-value pharmaceutical products, the stakes couldn’t be higher. Not only is a single consignment of high-value drugs potentially worth upwards of $50 million, but, for those patients in need of these drugs, ensuring these products arrive on time and in optimal condition is quite literally a matter of life and death.

Historically, life science manufacturers have lacked the tools, resources, and technology necessary to gain full visibility into the environmental conditions their products are stored in as they traveled through the cold chain. Because data loggers only provided temperature data once the shipment had arrived at its final destination if a temperature excursion did occur, cold chain leaders could only find out after the fact. In fact, according to a 2014 study by IMS Health, the top 10 pharmaceutical companies lost an average of  $16 billion worth of product (20X the average pharma company’s price-to-earnings ratio) each year due to transportation problems, the resulting temperature excursions and other delays. For the entire pharmaceutical industry, losses exceeded $35 billion (1).

However, recent technological advancements in IoT, data management tools and connectivity have ushered in a new era of real-time temperature monitoring. Due to the emergence of better, faster and more accurate real-time monitoring tools, life sciences manufacturers can now track high-value products in real-time to ensure safe and on-time delivery.

In PART I of this whitepaper, Nick Basta of Pharmaceutical Commerce provides an overview of the evolution of real-time monitoring solutions.

PART II explores the business benefits of real-time, temperature monitoring solutions and best practices for implementations. The ideas, challenges, and solutions covered in the section were pulled from in-depth interviews with our expert speaker faculty.

If you would like a copy sent directly to you, please contact us here.