How RPA is poised to influence the pharma industry

RPA is an innovative technology that automates mundane and repetitive tasks associated with pharma processes. By removing manual labor from the equation, RPA allows for faster production and more efficient operations within the sector

- Dr. Radhika Mahadev

Many of the processes and tasks across industries take up a huge bandwidth of manpower and time – the direct consequence of which is reduced and slower productivity and smaller profit margin. This is where automation of processes can come in handy. The usage of Robotic Process Automation (RPA) has seen a great rise in the past few years, with many industries actively seeking and implementing effective pre-programmed software bots to handle processes that are repetitive, time-consuming, and more prone to errors.

Speaking of the pharmaceutical industry in particular, some of the primary bottlenecks it faces are the high costs of drug testing, regulatory expenditure, supply of new drugs into the market, and a lot more. Add the aforementioned people-intensive tasks to this, the expenses only rise even further. This is why RPA has already made inroads into the industry, especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, the pharmacy automation market projected to reach $8.2 billion by 2027, according to MarketsandMarkets. With this in mind, let’s take a look at the different avenues RPA will impact the pharma industry:

DR. RADHIKA MAHADEV, Head of Robotic Process Automation, Shared Business Service, Merck Life Science

Clinical Trials 

Clinical trials are a critical stage before a drug or a healthcare treatment can be made available to people, and the extent of data to be handled for this can come in the way of researchers focusing on the crux of their work. RPAs can free up their bandwidth by automating time-consuming and repetitive tasks.