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How recent executive orders—both under the Biden and Trump administrations—have reshaped the drug pricing landscape, and the legal challenges or uncertainties they present for pharmaceutical companies

What life sciences companies should be doing now to proactively prepare for further executive action on drug pricing and market access

The key differences in how executive policies versus legislative actions affect the pharma industry’s pricing and commercialization strategies

The legal and strategic risks executive policy shifts pose to investors and biopharma leaders who may be planning product launches or portfolio expansion over the next few years

Alice Valder Curran outlines the steps manufacturers should take to better prepare for upcoming executive actions on drug pricing and market access.

How Recent Executive Orders Impact the Drug Pricing Landscape

interview, Tracy Lopez, North America’s head of customer service and 3PL operations for Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories, explains:

How the third-party logistics (3PL) process typically operates

Key factors manufacturers should take into account when choosing a 3PL, along with the range of services a reliable 3PL should offer

The important lessons learned since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic that have contributed to improving operational efficiencies

Trends within the pharmaceutical industry that 3PLs should be preparing for

The role of 3PLs in shaping the pharmaceutical industry over the next decade

Tracy Lopez uncovers the fundamentals pertaining to third-party logistics providers.

Selecting the Right 3PL

 interview, Donald Prentiss, founder and CEO of Qualthera, explains:

The role that compounding pharmacies play in the pharmaceutical supply chain

How compounding pharmacies helped bridge the gap for patients in need of their medication (especially during the tirzepatide shortage), while dispelling the notion that commercialized and compounded drugs are competing with one another.

What he believes needs to be done amid the various legal battles pertaining to GLP-1s that are currently taking place

The inspiration behind Qualthera, along with its objectives

Donald Prentiss discusses the value of these pharmacies, especially during shortages.

A Closer Look Into the Role of Compounding Pharmacies 

The history behind the Drug Supply Chain Security Act (DSCSA)

The latest DSCSA exemptions and what that means for trading partners

How this piece of legislation and AI are able to intertwine

Nicholas Saraceno offers an overview of the legislation and how it impacts the pharma supply chain.

Nov. 27 is Here: What Does That Mean for DSCSA?

 interview, Rob Sobie, chief product officer of Intelliguard, a provider of hospital medication management and data intelligence solutions, discusses:

The key challenges that hospitals are currently facing

Why he believes that the drug supply chain is failing

Successes surrounding the implementation of RFID technology

A high-level overview of the Drug Supply Chain Security Act, along with his thoughts on the latest exemptions that were recently announced by the FDA

Rob Sobie outlines the importance of supply chain transparency for the benefit of patients.  

The Impact of RFID: Enhancing Medication Management

 interview, Chris Williams, International Managing Director of Alloga Europe and ICS, discusses:

What’s needed to support advanced therapy medicinal products from a temperature standpoint

The current state of third-party logistics (3PLs) in Europe and what areas need to improve

How expectations of pharma companies have changed in terms of what they expect a 3PL partner to provide

How Alloga’s new facilities in Spain and the Netherlands fit within the company’s strategy

What he believes 3PLs can do to support supply chains more efficiently

Chris Williams expands on the services that a third-party logistics (3PL) partner should offer, while sharing ways to alleviate standard supply chain issues.

The Capabilities of a 3PL Provider

 interview, Peter Ax, founder and CEO of UpScriptHealth, a direct-to-consumer telehealth company, describes:

Why he believes ongoing and active drug shortages are the highest they’ve been since ASHP began tracking this in 2001

The current landscape of shortages in general

How drug shortages directly affect patients

What is needed to alleviate these issues surrounding the supply chain

Peter Ax provides insight as to industry’s lack of supply, along with how to mitigate these issues. 

Addressing the Drug Shortage Crisis

 interview, Chip Davis, president and CEO of the Healthcare Distribution Alliance (HDA), a national organization that represents primary pharmaceutical distributors, discusses:

The benefits of the Distribution Management Conference, and the value it provides for the industry

, including a look at how the challenges presented to distributors now differ, and how they are being addressed

Progress that has been made toward full connectivity since the FDA announced a “stabilization period” to finalize implementation of the DSCSA before November 2024, along with some of the most significant issues for trading partners

Some of the root causes of drug shortages, and how distributors are work to mitigate them

Key initiatives and plans that the HDA is focused on for the second half of 2024, and how these will shape the future of the pharmaceutical supply chain.

Chip Davis recaps the organization’s Distribution Management Conference and addresses distributors’ preparedness for DSCSA implementation. 

Overcoming Supply Chain Challenges

 interview, Allen Jacques, a life sciences industry thought leader at Kinaxis, dives into:

What he sees as limitations of current government efforts when it comes to boosting domestic production of essential medicines, and why they aren’t sufficient

The challenges that generic drug manufacturers are facing today

Why more resilient and transparent supply chains are necessary in the pharmaceutical industry, and how these can help mitigate shortage issues

Allen Jacques explains the history behind medications’ lack of supply, while offering ways to help alleviate their impact. 

Mitigating Drug Shortages

 interview, Brandon Newman, Xevant’s CEO and founder, explores:

The implications of the Inflation Reduction Act’s price negotiation provisions, and how these could result in ripple effects across the healthcare system

The role that pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) and other intermediaries' play when it comes to determining drug costs, and how spread pricing is involved

How Xevant helps improve drug cost transparency efforts

Strategies for affordability Newman would offer the pharma industry that can be implemented immediately

Brandon Newman joins The Pharmaceutical Commerce Podcast to discuss the evolving role of PBMs, including the importance of drug price transparency. 

A Further Examination of Pharmacy Benefit Managers

The acquisition of Cryoport’s specialty courier business is now finalized, with a value of approximately $200 million. 

DHL Officially Obtains CRYOPDP

In an effort to greater prepare HCPs and to avoid potential shortages, the company targets Q3 as the shipment date.

Sanofi to Begin Globally Shipping Beyfortus Ahead of RSV Season

Potential import taxes on pharma goods entering the United States continue to have effects on the industry in more ways than one. 

The Tariff Effect: Greater Supply Chain Prepares for Repercussions 

The installation of the new vial, syringe, and cartridge line is expected to take place throughout the coming year.

Bora Expands Baltimore Facility, Adds Automated Fill-Finish Line 

As this medical approach continues to become more widely adopted, the industry must adapt to help provide precise, compliant, temperature-controlled, delivery of highly individualized treatments.

How the Rise of Personalized Medicine Impacts Life Sciences’ Logistics

Embedded Product Intelligence’s Role in Maintaining Cold Chain Integrity

, Kirsten Newquist, Identiv’s CEO, defines “smart pharma packaging” as the integration of technology into pharmaceutical packaging to enhance product identification, tracking, and patient engagement. She explains that packaging primarily involves embedding technologies such as RFID radio-frequency identification (RFID) or Bluetooth low energy (BLE) into pharmaceutical containers. These technologies assign a unique digital ID to each package, enabling serialization, which is critical for tracking and traceability across the global supply chain.

This digital ID allows stakeholders—from manufacturers to pharmacists and patients—to verify a drug’s authenticity at every step of its journey. This significantly reduces the risk of counterfeit drugs entering the system, as products can be authenticated upon delivery or administration. Newquist emphasizes that this kind of smart packaging not only strengthens supply chain security but also fosters better patient engagement, offering real-time data that can support dosage verification and proper usage.

Additionally, she notes a secondary dimension of smart packaging: smart drug delivery systems. These include technologically enhanced devices like auto-injectors, smart pillboxes, or connected syringes, which offer further layers of verification and ensure patients receive the correct medication and dosage. While this may go beyond traditional packaging, it aligns with the broader goals of improving safety, compliance, and confidence in the pharmaceutical supply chain.

Overall, smart pharma packaging plays a crucial role in combating drug counterfeiting by improving transparency and traceability from production to patient use. By embedding intelligence into packaging and delivery systems, the pharmaceutical industry is better equipped to protect product integrity and ensure patient safety in an increasingly complex global supply chain.

Newquist also comments on the role embedded product intelligence plays in maintaining cold chain integrity, and why is this so critical for pharmaceutical safety and efficacy; how regulatory mandates, such as the Drug Supply Chain Security Act (DSCSA), influence the adoption of smarter packaging technologies across the industry; some of the biggest challenges pharmaceutical companies face in implementing this infrastructure, and much more.

What role does embedded product intelligence play in maintaining cold chain integrity, and why is this so critical for pharmaceutical safety and efficacy?

In addition to a digital ID, you can also embed sensors into the smart packaging, so you can embed temperature sensors, humidity sensors, pressure sensors, and obviously, probably the most critical for cold chain management is temperature sensors.

What this really enables you to do—especially if you're using active-sensing technology in combination with RFID—is really be able to track in real time the temperature of these very expensive, organic pharmaceuticals that are really driving the industry growth today. I think it's absolutely a critical part of what smart packaging can do, and as you said, the rise of personalized medicine, the rise of all these organic compounds that are being developed by the pharmaceutical industry, they absolutely do require very careful monitoring throughout the supply chain.

I think this technology that enables not only the digital identification—but can also include sensors to monitor temperature—can be a real game changer, by ensuring that these drugs are being taken through the supply chain at the appropriate temperature. By getting this information in real time, if they see that it's not being maintained at the proper refrigeration level, there’s actually things that they can do to ensure it gets back into refrigeration to really maintain the compliance that they need for the right temperatures. We think that's a really important part of the smart packaging trends.

In the second part of her Pharma Commerce video interview, Kirsten Newquist, Identiv’s CEO, describes why this technology is essential for pharmaceutical safety and efficacy.

What Is Smart Pharma Packaging?

, Kirsten Newquist, Identiv’s CEO, defines "smart pharma packaging" as the integration of technology into pharmaceutical packaging to enhance product identification, tracking, and patient engagement. She explains that packaging primarily involves embedding technologies such as RFID radio-frequency identification (RFID) or Bluetooth low energy (BLE) into pharmaceutical containers. These technologies assign a unique digital ID to each package, enabling serialization, which is critical for tracking and traceability across the global supply chain.

How would you define “smart pharma packaging,” and how is it helping to combat the growing threat of counterfeit drugs in today’s global supply chain?

In my mind, what that really means is the integration of intelligence or technology into the packaging—in this case, putting an identification on the smart packaging. In the case of radio-frequency identification (RFID) or Bluetooth low energy (BLE) technology—which is a type of technology that my company develops—it's really giving everything a unique digital ID. It enables serialization of the product, which helps with tracking of the product through the supply chain. It helps with enabling traceability. It helps with engagement, once the patient or the pharmacist actually receives the product. It's really about adding this technology and intelligence to the packaging that's used for the pharmaceutical. That’s my primary definition.

There's a secondary one as well, where there's also smart drug delivery packaging. Maybe that goes beyond what your question is, but there is also technology that can be embedded into drug delivery devices, like syringes, auto injectors, or pill boxes that also enable patients to be ensured that they've got the right drug, that they've got the right dose, etc.

First and foremost, it's around true pharmaceutical packaging. Then secondly, I think there's also this pharmaceutical packaging concept that's really more around drug delivery, and in both cases, it really does help with counterfeiting, because it enables you to track the drug through the supply chain and trace it through the supply chain, but also when it gets to the patient or the pharmacist, doctor, or whoever is delivering the drug, they can verify that it is the actual drug, that it is not counterfeit. They can authenticate it and really make sure that it's not a counterfeit drug.

In the first part of her Pharma Commerce video interview, Kirsten Newquist, Identiv’s CEO, defines the term, and explains how it is helping to combat the growing threat of counterfeit drugs in today’s global supply chain.

Driving Supply Chain Resilience

Logility’s senior vice president of innovation

 addresses the gap between high interest in generative AI (GenAI) and its relatively low adoption in supply chain-specific applications, as highlighted in Logility’s 

. He identified several key reasons for this disconnect.

First, many companies experience “paralysis by analysis” due to the rapidly evolving technology landscape. With so many options and an unclear starting point, organizations often hesitate to act. Tillman emphasized the importance of adopting an agile, iterative approach—developing, deploying, learning, and refining continuously—rather than seeking a perfect solution from the outset.

Second, he pointed out a cultural shift that needs to happen within organizations. Companies must become more comfortable with experimentation in software implementation, viewing it as a learning process rather than a one-time deployment. This mindset change is essential for successfully leveraging emerging technologies like GenAI.

Financial and technical barriers also play a role. Expertise in GenAI is both scarce and costly, and training models can be time-consuming. Organizations face a strategic decision: whether to build their own AI models or depend on third-party software vendors. Tillman noted that this debate is still in its early stages, and its outcome will shape how companies integrate GenAI into their operations.

Finally, he stressed that in the supply chain space, companies will increasingly depend on vendors like Logility to provide specialized expertise and value-driven use cases. These could include demand sensing, forecasting insights, and other prescriptive applications of GenAI tailored to business needs. Overall, Tillman advocated for a practical, phased approach to GenAI adoption, focusing on clear, impactful use cases rather than waiting for the perfect solution.

He also comments on some common misconceptions supply chain leaders might have about what it means to be “digitally optimized;” the role of automation and GenAI evolving in workforce development; how geopolitical or economic volatility can potentially reshape the way organizations prioritize supply chain investments; and much more.

Looking ahead to the rest of 2025 and 2026, how do you see geopolitical or economic volatility reshaping the way organizations prioritize supply chain investments—especially in tech and talent?

 I think there's a focus on supply chain resilience and technology that enables that resilience, because there's a lot of uncertainty out there, and nobody knows where the next potential uncertainty is going to occur. Trying to plan around specific types of uncertainty is difficult. I think companies are looking to invest in technologies that drive resilience, so that they can have a pocket of understanding that regardless of where that uncertainty comes from—whether it be tariffs, political, COVID, some sort of pandemic-type thing that impacts the supply chain. They're focused on resilience.

One of the things we're seeing is a lot of investment in technologies that deal with your network. How does your network respond? How is your network flexible? How do you assess the risk in your network? I think managing supply chains in terms of risk is something that you're going to see moving forward more so than what has been in the past. There's always been an element of scenarios, and trying to plan around scenarios—but thinking about it more from a financial risk standpoint—and then using that risk assessment to look and prioritize how you might build that resiliency into your supply chain is going to be more of a focus as we move forward. I think companies are not looking at specific types of risk. They're measuring how we make our supply chains more resilient to handle any type of risk that might come forward.

In the final part of his Pharma Commerce video interview, Scott Tillman, Logility’s senior vice president of innovation, discusses how uncertainty can help reshape the way organizations prioritize supply chain investments.

Amplifying Workforce Development

With talent retention cited as a key concern, how do you see the role of automation and GenAI evolving in workforce development—particularly in onboarding and reskilling efforts?

 There's a level of automation that's going to make onboarding much smoother and much more consistent. Imagine, you get into your first day in a role, there’re personalized messages, there're training modules, everything is consistent based on a process that's outlined by your HR department. It's not going to be so much who your mentor was the first day—it's going to be able to be more consistent.

You're still going to have to develop those personal relationships, but how you develop those and the tools that you have available to you will be consistent. From a reskilling standpoint—or just an ability to use GenAI to customize onboarding opportunities based on your particular skill set—if you go through a training class and you answer a certain set of questions, those questions are captured by AI. That AI can potentially recommend the next set of training that is required for you in a way that's capturing that data and make it very personalized to how you learn, and how you might answer certain questions. That type of customized training is going to allow companies to onboard resources much faster than what they have in the past.

I know from experience that I'm very much an auditory learner. I like to listen to things, repeat things. I'd much rather listen to a class than read a book or that portion of it. If you think about how GenAI can capture that type of information for individuals and then customize a training path for that individual that says, “hey, here's some videos for you to watch,” as opposed to somebody who might be more of a visual leaner, they might want more things around reading. It’s going to customize a path that I think will be based more on your personality, and it will help onboard those resources more quickly.


In the third part of his Pharma Commerce video interview, Scott Tillman, Logility’s senior vice president of innovation, comments on the role of automation and GenAI evolving in workforce development.

Being Digitally Optimized

The data shows a disconnect between perceived modernization and actual performance. What are some common misconceptions supply chain leaders might have about what it means to be “digitally optimized”?

One of the primary misconceptions is that tools equal optimization. I read a study the other day that SAP implementations—or clients that implemented SAP—are frozen on the original version they implemented, even if they’ve been upgraded. Part of that is the change management they did around the implementation was focused at the time they did the implementation, and it's not a continuous improvement process around how do we continue to improve moving forward when we implement software or we upgrade software.

I think there's this inflated idea that tools equal optimization, when there are processes around optimization that need to change. If you're not focused on doing the change management or the process improvement around the tools that you're implementing or upgrading to, that leads to people and clients thinking they're digitally optimized when they're really not. The other part is that there's just this inflated expectation that there's this immediate return on investment you're going to get when you adopt or do a transformation project. It really is one of those aspects where you need to think about the context of the solution you're implementing, and how that solution is going to improve your overall business processes.

I think that supply chain leaders need to look at this as that it's a continuous improvement-type opportunity when you implement a software, and you need to make sure you have that mechanism in place to take advantage of continuous improvement opportunities that the software vendor is going to provide you.


In the second part of his Pharma Commerce video interview, Scott Tillman, Logility’s senior vice president of innovation, discusses the common misconceptions supply chain leaders might have around the term, and why the processes around optimization need to change.

Bridging the GenAI Adoption Gap in Supply Chain

Despite high adoption interest in GenAI, Logility’s 

Supply Chain Horizons 2025 Market Report 

notes that only a third of organizations use supply chain-specific applications. What do you think is driving that gap?

There are a couple of things. One is that I think companies don't know where to start. The landscape and technology are changing so fast that there's a paralysis by analysis thought loop that companies are stuck in. The key part is not where you end up, but where you start. Companies aren't comfortable working in this agile mindset where they develop, deploy, learn, modify, and repeat the cycle over and over.

I think there's this mindset that needs to change inside companies regarding software in which they're willing to be more experimentative than what they have been in the past, because there is an element of learning from the implementation that they're going to apply to the next phase of the implementation. This is definitely something that is more a journey and not a destination.

There're also the financial considerations. Expertise is difficult. Expertise is expensive. Training models can take be difficult and take time, so there's this battle going on in the market, whether or not you want to build your own models internally, or whether you want to rely on software vendors to potentially supply models. I think that battle is going to play out over time. I think it's very much in its infancy, and we'll see how companies adopt the software aspect of it.

From a supply chain perspective, companies are going to rely on their supply chain vendors to really supply that expertise, and that's where Logility/AP Gene is looking to provide that expertise in focusing on specific business cases that can provide value—whether it be regarding drop demands, whether it be insights into your forecast. Be prescriptive in how GenAI is going to provide that information to our clients.


In the first part of his Pharma Commerce video interview, Scott Tillman, Logility’s senior vice president of innovation, describes the disparity in organizations utilizing supply-chain specific applications. 

How Digitization Drives End to End Supply Chain Success

PC: How would you define successful E2E, and what specific processes are necessary in order to achieve this?

The first thing I’d highlight—and I mentioned this in the keynote—is that we are a company of scale and history. It’s hard to visualize that scale without digitization. We’ve moved away from Excel and connected our data through advanced planning and ERP systems. This provides visibility at scale, which is critical for our integrated business planning process that we run monthly. It helps us evaluate scenarios for new products while optimizing service, inventory, and cost.

As a healthcare company, we believe a healthy planet supports healthy people. Sustainability is a major focus for us. Like many companies, we have visible targets: we aim to be carbon neutral by 2030 and reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2045. We're actively executing on these goals. Between 2019 and 2024, we've achieved a 47% reduction in Scope 1 and 2 emissions, and a 10% reduction in Scope 3 emissions.

Ruth Beadle, head, global supply chain, Sanofi, discusses how digital integration, advanced planning, and sustainability goals are transforming end-to-end supply chain operations to improve scale, speed, and environmental impact.

Supply Chain

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