Life sciences industry case studies

Affymetirx
DNA Pioneer Sees 10-Month Payback on FDA-Compliant Document Management System
Affymetrix, a pioneer in DNA analysis technology, needed a document management system that could accommodate its continued growth while meeting strict government regulations. It found that solution by migrating from Documentum to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. The new system has a projected payback in 10 months. Search time has been cut by 33 percent, and the solution provides long-term scalability.

GlaxoSmithKline
GlaxoSmithKline leads the way with Microsoft Online Services
GlaxoSmithKline (NYE: GSK) is a pharmaceutical industry leader: supplying a quarter of the world's vaccines, spending over $13 million each day to research new medicines, and providing many of the world's leading prescription medicines and consumer healthcare products. It is estimated that GlaxoSmithKline makes up seven percent of the world's pharmaceutical market, and it is one of the few companies committed to researching vaccines for the World Health Organization's three priority diseases - HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. Yet, an internal strategic review of their IT systems outlined a need to take a new approach to collaboration, support growing markets, and address costs. Illustrating its industry leadership, GlaxoSmithKline found its solution in pioneering Microsoft Online Services solutions.

Chiese Pharmaceutical Group
Pharmaceutical company supports competitiveness and growth with business solution
In 2005, French subsidiary Chiesi France engaged Sylis Business Solution, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, to implement Microsoft Dynamics AX as an integrated management software solution. Sylis also implemented its custom-built solution Axapta Pharma, which is developed specifically for the pharmaceutical industry and based on Microsoft Dynamics AX.

Isotechnika, Inc.
International biopharmaceutical company improves time to market with collaboration tools in the 2007 Microsoft Office system
In order to bring drugs to market faster, Isotechnika needed a solution that would improve communication and collaboration with outside parties and automate the drug trial protocol documentation process.

The Kruuse Group
Veterinary supplier drives sales, cuts costs with business intelligence solution
The Kruuse Group, a global leader in veterinary supplies, wanted more intelligence than it was getting from its Oracle-based business intelligence system. So Kruuse turned to timeXtender 2.0 software and Microsoft SQL Server 2005. It now hosts five data cubes instead of one, and 30 standard reports instead of 3. Customizations that took two weeks are now implemented whenever needed. Better analysis drives sales, marketing, and operational efficiencies.

Paladin Labs
Paladin Labs empowers Data Management staff with Microsoft Dynamics CRM
Montreal-based Paladin Labs Inc. is one of Canada’s leading specialty pharmaceutical companies. A critical part of the company’s success and growth is its ability to consistently bring new and innovative products to the market. As the company looked at its growth strategy, management realized it needed a more flexible Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system that would grow and change with the business. Working under tight migration deadlines, Paladin teamed up with Microsoft technology partner SCI Inc. to implement Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Today, the flexible customer relationship management solution is helping Paladin Labs realize significant cost savings. As well, sales staff can pull real-time data from the CRM system to make more informed decisions, while managers can get a more comprehensive, up-to-date view of the business.

Pfizer
Pfizer Boosts Efficiency by 15 Percent with Easy to Use, Shared Note-Taking Program
For the past 150 years, Pfizer has pioneered the development of some of the industry’s most innovative pharmaceutical products. In 2007, Pfizer applied this "out of the box" thinking to a pilot program designed to enhance efficiency and knowledge management across project teams, and potentially speed time-to-market for new products. The pilot brought together the simple, intuitive user interface of the Microsoft® Office OneNote® 2007 note-taking program with the robust document management technology of Microsoft Office SharePoint® Server 2007. As a result, pilot participants reported a significant decrease in the number of e-mail messages they send each day, and one group reported a 15 percent increase in efficiency. Overall, the 600 participants reported a 2 percent time savings per week, which represents a cost savings of approximately U.S.$2.25 million.

Roche Diagnostics
Biotech Firm Implements Efficient IT Document Management System to Meet Compliance Needs
A leader in in-vitro diagnostics, Roche Diagnostics manages a vast and expanding volume of molecular insights and translates it into products with high medical value for physicians and patients. Because of the complex and detailed nature of this work, Roche Diagnostics has stringent requirements for document management and storage. The company wanted to replace its existing document management system for IT projects with a new solution offering a more robust feature set. With help from Microsoft Gold Certified Partner Alegri International, Roche Diagnostics built a solution based on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, providing comprehensive security features, workflow support for the entire document life cycle, and automated Portable Document Format (PDF) rendering and publishing. The solution is designed to comply with strict U.S. Food and Drug Administration regulations.

Scripps Research Institute
Biomedical institute speeds researcher productivity 600 percent for faster insights
Structural biology researchers at The Scripps Research Institute, a leading biomedical research center, used to process test results manually, inhibiting the pace of their work and limiting the time they could spend thinking creatively about their research. To boost productivity, they adopted a custom high-performance computing (HPC) solution based on Windows® HPC Server 2008. Now, test results are processed 600 percent faster, giving researchers the time they need to analyze their work more thoroughly and to identify more productive research directions. The HPC applications for the solution were created quickly and easily using Microsoft® development tools, and the entire solution life cycle is managed centrally and effectively by a single system developer.