Outsourcing Articles

The need to accelerate drug development has led to the rise of global clinical trials in search of large patient populations. Along with increasing trial complexity, which requires more esoteric testing to be done closer to the patient, this has spurred the CRO industry's recent central lab expansion initiatives.

t is no secret that clinical development represents the longest and most cumbersome aspect of launching new drugs into the global marketplace. Product development challenges have increased due to increased regulatory requirements, new technologies, and the complexity of studies being conducted.

By Kristin Brooks

Ninth Annual Salary Survey

Welcome to the Ninth Annual Contract Pharma Salary Survey! This year’s results are derived from 450 respondents from our readership about employment attitudes, responsibilities, education, and salaries.

The winner of our 80gb iPod Classic drawing is Irina Kadiyala of Vertex Pharmaceuticals!  Enjoy it in good health, Irina!

ob Hamm, executive vice president, pharmaceutical operations & technology, at Biogen Idec (BI), says his company didn't think twice about putting serialized, two-dimensional (2-D) barcodes on containers of Avonex and Tysabri, the two main products manufactured by the Cambridge, MA-based biotechnology company.

By Cindy Dubin

The need for contained handling and processing of pharmaceuticals started to rise significantly about 20 years ago with the development of more highly potent active pharmaceutical ingredients (HPAPI's). As Big Pharma was pushed to fill pipelines with blockbusters, they did so with easy molecules.

Outsourcing to CMOs is increasing on all fronts, regardless of expression system, and this trend looks like it will continue to benefit CMOs at least through 2012. This is according to the results of the just-released 5th Annual Report and Survey of Biopharmaceutical Manufacturing Capacity and Production.