The Pistoia Alliance, a global, not-for-profit alliance that works to lower barriers to innovation in life sciences R&D, has announced the results of a survey on the adoption of blockchain in the pharmaceutical and life science industries. According to the survey, 60 percent of pharmaceutical and life science professionals are either using or experimenting with blockchain today, compared to 22 percent when asked in 2017; however, 40 percent are not currently looking at implementing, or have no plans to implement blockchain. The biggest barriers identified to adoption are access to skilled blockchain personnel (55 percent), and that blockchain is too difficult to understand (16 percent). These factors underline why The Pistoia Alliance is calling for the life science and pharmaceutical industries to collaborate over the development and implementation of blockchain.
The survey also showed life science and pharmaceutical professionals are becoming more aware of the capabilities of blockchain. Respondents believed the greatest opportunities for using blockchain lie in the medical supply chain (30 percent), electronic medical records (25 percent), clinical trials management (20 percent), and scientific data sharing (15 percent). Of the benefits of blockchain, life science and pharmaceutical professionals believe the most significant is the immutability of data (73 percent). Significantly, for an industry with tight regulations, 39 percent also believe the transparency of the blockchain system is its best feature. However, almost one fifth (18 percent) of professionals believe using blockchain adds no value beyond a traditional database, showing there is some reluctance in the industry to use the technology. The Pistoia Alliance believes that some of the misconceptions about blockchain can be overcome with greater education of those in industry.
The Pistoia Alliance is continuing its drive to educate the life science industry about blockchain. Interested parties may join The Pistoia Alliance's two-day Blockchain Bootcamp on October 8 and 9 in Boston. The event will consist of an introduction to the Hyperledger platform, as well as a mini hackathon incorporating a range of life science use cases, which will allow participants to code their own blockchain-enabled apps in teams.
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