Global Survey Reveals Urgency to Accelerate Study Start-up

Accelerating study start-up is a top priority for life sciences companies according to the Veeva 2020 Study Start-up Pulse Report & Assessing Post-COVID Readiness, a global study start-up survey of more than 500 clinical operations professionals. Findings from Veeva Systems (NYSE: VEEV) show an industrywide shift to streamline study activation and speed clinical trials.

While there is an overall move underway in life sciences to modernize trial execution, COVID-19 has prompted an even greater need to keep existing trials on track and get new studies up and running faster. This research reveals that study start-up is an area of significant potential to speed trials, which is especially timely as sponsors and CROs ready for a major wave of post COVID-19 trial starts.

All sponsors and CROs surveyed report the need to improve study start-up. Nearly all (98%) have significant challenges, many stemming from delays in the first steps to launch trials. Top drivers for improving study start-up are accelerated start-up times (75%) and reduced manual processes (53%). The majority say automating activities such as contracting and budgeting, and site essential document collection can positively impact trial quality and speed.

A heavy reliance on applications that are not fit for purpose are slowing trials. The majority (81%) use spreadsheets to manage study start-up and roughly half use other applications that are not purpose-built for this area, like eTMF and CTMS.

Most sponsors and CROs use a combination of spreadsheets and multiple applications—not only slowing study starts, but also creating system and process siloes. The more tools used, the greater number of study start-up challenges companies report. The industry, however, is taking action as a quarter of respondents are adopting study start-up applications to streamline trials.

“Study activation is one of the most time and resource-intensive areas of drug development, so companies are working hard to eliminate start-up delays and minimize downstream risks to study milestones,” said Ashley Davidson, senior director, Veeva Vault Study Startup. “This is especially important as the industry races to get trial timelines back on track that have been disrupted by COVID-19.”

The Veeva 2020 Study Start-up Pulse Report explores the life sciences industry’s progress towards streamlining study start-up by gathering the experiences and opinions of more 500 clinical operations professionals around the globe. The goal of the research is to understand the drivers, barriers, and benefits of modernizing clinical systems and processes to accelerate trials and gives an industrywide view of study start-up technology adoption. Get the full report at veeva.com/eu/StudyStartupReport.

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About Veeva Systems

Veeva Systems Inc. is the leader in cloud-based software for the global life sciences industry. Committed to innovation, product excellence, and customer success, Veeva serves more than 875 customers, ranging from the world's largest pharmaceutical companies to emerging biotechs. Veeva is headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area, with offices throughout North America, Europe, Asia, and Latin America. For more information, visit veeva.com/eu.

Forward-looking Statements

This release contains forward-looking statements, including the market demand for and acceptance of Veeva’s products and services, the results from use of Veeva’s products and services, and general business conditions (including the on-going impact of COVID-19), particularly within the life sciences industry. Any forward-looking statements contained in this press release are based upon Veeva’s historical performance and its current plans, estimates, and expectations, and are not a representation that such plans, estimates, or expectations will be achieved. These forward-looking statements represent Veeva’s expectations as of the date of this press announcement. Subsequent events may cause these expectations to change, and Veeva disclaims any obligation to update the forward-looking statements in the future. These forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially. Additional risks and uncertainties that could affect Veeva’s financial results are included under the captions, “Risk Factors” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” in the company’s filing on Form 10-Q for the period ended April 30, 2020. This is available on the company’s website at veeva.com under the Investors section and on the SEC’s website at sec.gov. Further information on potential risks that could affect actual results will be included in other filings Veeva makes with the SEC from time to time.

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Contact information

Roger Villareal
Veeva Systems
925-264-8885
roger.villareal@veeva.com

Kiran May
Veeva Systems
+44-796-643-2912
kiran.may@veeva.com