Altasciences — a pioneering contract research organization (CRO) based in North America— is leading the conversation on change in the drug development industry as part of a new documentary series ahead of the 2024 Global Health Summit in Geneva in May, hosted alongside the World Health Organization’s 77th World Health Assembly. Altasciences has been at the forefront of building an all-in-one early-phase drug development solution that aims to help sponsors bring new, and better, medicine into the hands of patients, faster.
The mini documentary titled “Flipping the Drug Development Industry on its Head” explores transformation in a slow-to-change industry. The interviewees dive into the obstacles and inefficiencies of the traditional outsourcing relationship between CROs and drug sponsors, and how Altasciences has broken from tradition to address these challenges. Altasciences’ CEO Chris Perkin is joined by Marie-Hélène Raigneau (Co-COO), Steve Mason (Co-COO), and Dr. Gaetano Morelli (Chief Medical Officer) to share their insider insight and experience.
“At Altasciences, we’re challenging the status quo and disrupting the CRO model,” says Steve Mason, Co-chief Operating Officer, when speaking of how Altasciences has established an alternative outsourcing paradigm. The company centralizes preclinical research, clinical pharmacology, bioanalysis, formulation, and manufacturing, to provide sponsors with a comprehensive solution that simplifies and safely accelerates early-phase drug development.
The CRO market has grown exponentially over the years, with projections to reach an estimated worth of USD 127.3 billion by 2028. For the most part, CROs continue to function as auxiliaries to pharmaceutical companies, applying niche expertise to conduct work sponsors cannot complete in-house. Based on each CRO’s expertise, sponsors have historically sought out partners to complete different aspects or phases of their research and development (R&D). Growing pipelines, rising costs of in-house drug development, and increasing complexity of new medicine and therapies, have prompted biotechnology, biopharmaceutical, and pharmaceutical companies to outsource even more of their R&D to CROs.
“The CRO industry hasn’t really changed in its siloed approach since the 1960s, but the drug development industry has,” explains Chris Perkin, CEO at Altasciences. “Using the original way of progressing drugs through development means that it takes longer and it’s less efficient.” Altasciences’ mission to improve speed and ease of the drug development journey with its innovative, integrated approach, solidifies its place as a leader for change in the CRO world.
Watch the Altasciences Global Health Documentary Here.
Featured Photo by Louis Reed on Unsplash.