Globe Tracker (GT) has developed unique technology around a cargo tracking solution that enables supply chain integrity at a cost well below, and with greater functionality than that of alternative solutions. The potential for the solution is to make relevant information available to the industry’s stakeholders in a way that adds value in the supply chain and enables new, more customer centric, business models. The purpose of this study is to address application of this technology to the pharmaceutical supply chain.
The study focuses on multiple questions for monitoring pharma integrity during transport including:
1. What is the size of the market, what are the trends, and how do recent regulatory drivers and other market requirements effect the adoption of better pharma monitoring technology, and;
2. What are the customer requirements for monitoring, limitations of current technology, and how can these gaps be filled.
New biomedicines to treat both common and complex illnesses are advancing very rapidly. These advances pose new challenges in delivering these medicines to patients safely and at lower costs. Most emerging pharma products are biopharmaceuticals that need to be distributed in a strictly controlled and refrigerated environment to protect the integrity of the drugs. The 2014 Biopharma Cold Chain Source Book indicated that most new trials globally are biologics based medicines confirming a big global trend in pharma products.
In addition, new global regulatory requirements are emerging for the transportation of pharmaceuticals with more stringent controls than in the past. The consequences of temperature excursions with these new drugs, not only has impact on patient safety, but enormous financial impact as well.
Virtually all electronic monitoring of pharmaceuticals in the supply chain is performed with recorders, so these technologies can only provide a “rear-view” of transport conditions. GT has developed technology which can provide real-time and better overall accuracy and performance.
Most of the Intellectual Property (IP) relates to designing and assembling a low cost functional device and specialized software that runs cloud based data storage and analytics solution. The solution has reached commercial traction within the reefer market since 2014 and is in the process of scaling with key logistics firms in the segment of food transportation.
An adjacent and high value market segment is that of the biopharma cold logistics chain. While similar in that it often uses the same type of refers for transporting biopharma as food, the demand on supply chain integrity is quite unique. While much of pharma today is shipped by air, there is an ever increasing trend toward refrigerated surface transport, and this presents a whole new set of issues. The key difference lies in the fact that pharma requires strict adherence with regulatory compliance such as temperature control and accurate recordkeeping, and that there may be somewhat different regulatory requirements across nations. The nature of biopharma logistics is global by nature, so this creates a very complex scenario for pharmacos and transporters across borders. GT technology can address all modes of shipment.
This study focuses on both technical feasibility and market feasibility, which includes market assessment as well. In addition, GT has designed a feasibility trial with major logistics firms in this sector in order to establish exactly what the technical requirements and the commercial opportunities are in this market.
