In an interaction with Industry Outlook, Amit Chopra, Managing Director - India & South Asia, Thermo Fisher Scientific, shares his views on the current evolution of laboratory equipment market, the challenges involved, and ways to address them.
The increasing momentum of research in pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries across the globe is boosting the demand for laboratory equipment. How do you see this market evolving in India?
The pandemic has bolstered the importance of innovation, R&D, and the need for cutting-edge and advanced technologies in the pharma, healthcare, and life sciences industries. It has opened new opportunities for the laboratory equipment market from areas higher-up in the value chain, such as drug discovery, development, API (Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient) manufacturing and more. A report from Research and Markets predicts the Asia Pacific region to show robust growth opportunities as a result of the rise in prevalence of chronic diseases and growing investments in pharma research. As the industry progresses, advancements in lab equipment too will rise.
Further, with renewed focus on managing infectious diseases, the industry is experiencing a wave of advances – from new treatment modalities, to smart machines, superior analytics, and digital connectivity. Proactive government initiatives and disruptions in the global supply are further propelling growth in the laboratory equipment market. Overall, equipping laboratories with scientific solutions and instruments that can enhance efficiency, improve time-to-market, ensure quality and offer workforce agility will continue to be the factors that drive market evolvement.
Today, pharma laboratories are smart and digitally connected. How is Thermo Fisher positioned in this market?
We are in the era of Industry 4.0, where technologies are bringing a paradigm shift in pharmaceutical manufacturing and logistics platforms through digitization, autonomous
systems, robotics, and computing advancements. Digitalization and connectivity are gradually becoming fundamental in the pharma space, where end-to-end monitoring of routine processes such as storage, system data logs and documentation takes precedence.
At Thermo Fisher Scientific, we are dedicated to supporting labs with modernized laboratory information management systems specially designed to improve lab productivity and efficiency by keeping track of data associated with experiments, samples, laboratory workflows and instruments. Our LIMS software automates workflows while tracking all the important sample information, workflows, and QA/QC results that the lab generates each day.
With the pandemic still impacting all of us, Thermo Fisher, with its compelling portfolio of products and capabilities, is uniquely positioned to empower customers with state-of-the-art digitization tools to make laboratories smart, help reduce human error, and enhance data traceability and integrity.
Quality assurance is the primary objective for the customers in this segment in order to maintain the reliability and effectiveness of the lab. How does Thermo Fisher ensure the same?
We are a fast-paced and innovative company, and our commitment to quality is vital to our growth and success. At Thermo Fisher, we have made significant investments across all our manufacturing processes, and our facilities meet the global industry quality standards. From design and development, to delivery, we are continuously improving our products to ensure reliability and global regulatory compliance. This is crucial, especially in our business because quality assurance means ensuring drug safety & efficacy, adherence to standards & process and countless other important outcomes impacting our customers and society at large.
Pharma Companies Will Need To Adopt And Deploy New Generation Technologies To Streamline Their Business Processes In Every Department
Where do you see the pharma market in the near future in terms of new technology adoption? How is it going to transform further?
Even before the pandemic, the increased volume of drug discovery and continuous R&D compelled the pharma and lab equipment market to rise exponentially. COVID-19 has accelerated this growth with significant investments from government and private players in lab infrastructure and equipment to recalibrate strategies across the value chain and serve critical needs of patients. Pharma companies will need to adopt and deploy new generation technologies to streamline their business processes in every department. They need to achieve near real-time transparency from R&D to supply chain networks, as well as meet new expectations in efficiency from customers and suppliers.
The industry currently is leveraging data analytics and IoT to a great extent, and in the coming days, we will see fast-paced adoption of emerging technologies like AR/VR and blockchain making significant contributions in supply chain and patient care. Further, digitization and automation will also ensure better quality and compliance by reducing manual errors and variability, as well as allowing faster and effective resolution of problems.
Overall, the industry is set to transform and focus more on network optimization, patient-centricity, and meeting new demands of capacity and efficiency to remain more agile and resilient.
