China’s Shenzhen Mindray Bio-Medical Electronics Co., Ltd. was founded on a simple but idealistic principle: Better Healthcare for all.

To achieve that vision, the global developer, manufacturer, and supplier of medical devices intends to make health care more accessible worldwide.

But as the cliché goes, that mission is easier said than done, and the difficulties of realizing this goal were never so apparent as when the global pandemic began.

The encroaching virus led to skyrocketing requests for complicated patient monitoring and life-support systems, some customized, others restricted by local regulations.

The surging requests for price quotations were overflowing the normal channel, sometime via email or phone and processed offline. Given the volume and wide range of time zones the company served, timely replies were difficult to deliver. 

The operational challenges and communication gaps have prompted sales staff and dealers to demand for a simple, digital platform that could configure prices quickly and ensure rapid delivery of the vital items – a solution that had to be created as COVID fears were escalating and the medical industry was changing in unprecedented ways.

A transformative vision

With more than 30 years in business, Shenzhen Mindray Bio-Medical Electronics., Ltd. – named for the city connecting Hong Kong to China’s mainland – serves patients in nearly 110,000 of the country’s medical institutions. The company – commonly referred to as Mindray – also has about 50 affiliates outside China.

Of its 14,000+ employees, a quarter are research and development (R&D) engineers specializing in producing new forms of medical technology.

Even so, the company needed to go to enterprise resource planning (ERP) software leader SAP to create a solution to accurately configure and price its complex catalog of products.

A number of SAP technologies would be used, including SAP Variant and Pricing, a software specifically devoted to this particular task.

Prices could now be calculated based on factors like exclusive distribution, an arrangement in which a single distributor operates in a specific region, secondary distribution, which can involve a network of investors, and other considerations.

Everyone would have access to a data management system for dealers, product authorizations and strategies for observing regulatory and marketing requirements unique to certain regions.

Meeting every need

Mindray’s integrated global sales channel solution was deployed in October 2021, providing sales representatives with significant efficiency and user experience improvement, particularly when it came to serving prospective buyers with timely and accurate information.

“It allows us to quickly meet the unique needs of every customer,” Henry Wu, Mindray’s IT general manager, pointed out.

Now, there was unprecedented consistency and sufficiency in the information representatives were receiving about clients, order history and product details, allowing for a better understanding of what each customer wanted.

Manufacturing strategies, along with production planning and schedules, were now based on customer demands, while quotes and approvals could be generated online at a much faster pace.

Not only was time saved – by an astounding proportion – on requisitions, but order errors were becoming extremely rare.

“In just over a month, we processed 2,100 orders through our warehouse,” noted Wang Lue, the company’s application development and support manager.

Procedures that previously took up to two days per order could now be completed in as little as one hour.

Even outside the industry, the creation of the global sales channel solution was considered impressive. Earlier this year, Mindray was designated a finalist at the 2022 SAP Innovation Awards, a yearly ceremony recognizing organizations using SAP technologies to improve business as well as society.

With complete access to accurate, analytical data, the solution reduced the company’s risk in the global marketplace, preparing Mindray’s sales team for both the predictable and the arbitrary the next time a major health emergency occurs.

To learn the details behind their achievement, see Mindray’s Innovation Awards pitch deck.

Digital Transformation

Despite a push for automation across businesses of all kinds, the compliance review process for medical, educational, and promotional materials created for healthcare professionals and patients remains largely manual.

As an increased number of drugs are being launched, a proportionately higher number of promotional assets are being created. This high volume of promotional assets, combined with limitations in reviewer skills, can result in an increased time to market. Also, performing repeatable review checks manually can lead to increased costs. Given the growth in the volume of digital content being produced, life sciences companies need a digitized, enterprise-grade approach to prevent errors and accelerate compliance review.

Fortunately, with the right review and approval processes in place, these companies can document every step and publish all the information they need in a timely, compliant fashion.

Why governance is critical in medical review

Medical, legal, and regulatory (MLR) review refers to the process by which life sciences companies make sure that their promotional and advertising materials comply with internal and external regulations and guidelines. This process is non-negotiable for life sciences companies to get their marketing materials to the stakeholders, medical science liaisons, patients, and healthcare providers.

Effective and efficient MLR review processes can be set with a focus on governance and processes right from the beginning. The review framework needs to represent every group involved in the content strategy. The framework also needs to define the systems and processes to manage and review the content. Finally, with therapies becoming increasingly personalized, companies can no longer count on catering to a mass market.

All this creates a demand for a modular content strategy, and a review process flexible enough to manage narrowly tailored content needs.

How the power of cloud can help

Biotech and pharma companies are increasingly turning to technology to manage the robust creation and review processes required for their content. Both established and emerging life sciences companies can benefit by creating a strong content foundation with digital asset management systems.

With a dedicated MLR system, these companies can move beyond the complex paper processes of the past and keep the reviews flowing even when the reviewers are not always at the same location. The solution can use native AWS services, such its Relational Database Service and Elastic File System for storage requirements. It also can be extended to leverage AWS native cognitive services, such as Amazon Textract, Rekognition, and Comprehend. These services are scalable and can process complex tasks, such as text extraction, optical character recognition, and natural language processing.

TCS can provide a critical integration layer, via PromoRev – an AI- and machine-learning-enabled, cloud-based, insights-oriented platform for MLR review optimization. Our secured platform can be integrated with digital asset management systems, helping organizations to accelerate the MLR review cycle time.

MLR reviews have always been crucial for life sciences companies, and this is not going to change. However, the days of executing them on paper, spreadsheets, or PDFs can now be a thing of the past. By embracing a purpose-built MLR review system on cloud, life sciences companies can better manage the process and scale it to make it more efficient as the business grows.

Author Bio 1

TCS

Ph: +91 9650422144
E-mail: anand.singh@tcs.com

Anand Singh is an enterprise architect and senior consultant at TCS Business Transformation Group. He has over 24 years of experience in architecting digital solutions leveraging data, analytics, and artificial intelligence. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering.

Author Bio 2

TCS

Ph: +91 9911115375
E-mail: nitin.kumar@tcs.com

Nitin Kumar is the Global Head of Data & Analytics at TCS, BTG. Prior to the current role he was the Chief Digital Officer for the LifeSciences vertical at TCS and was responsible for multiple focus areas within the vertical such as Digital, Analytics, IoT, Digital Marketing etc. He has extensive experience of more than two decades in architecting domain led solutions, innovation driven technologies and large program management.

Author Bio 3

TCS

Ph: +91 9223265919
E-mail: mk.patel@tcs.com

Mihir Patel leads business solutions for LifeSciences and Healthcare in TCS’ AWS Business Unit. With more than 20 years in TCS, he has led many strategic customer engagements globally and provided key solutions to address clients’ needs. His specializations include enterprise architecture and cloud technologies.

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