etrials is in upheaval, with several executives coming and going. “etrials has been undergoing a series of rigorous Company-wide process improvement and reengineering initiatives designed to improve customer service, streamline internal processes, and at the same time reduce costs,” said president and CEO Chip Jennings. “In order to take full advantage of our re-engineering efforts, we have accelerated our planned organizational realignment strategy time line, which we expect to result in modest cost savings in the second half of 2008.” Here’s the release.

The Association of Clinical Research Organizations (ACRO), a lobbying group that represents the CRO industry, announced its participation in the recently formed Clinical Trial Transformation Initiative (CTTI), sponsored by Duke and the FDA. The goal of the CTTI is to modernize the mechanics of clinical trials and to increase their efficiency and productivity. Alberto Grignolo, corporate VP and GM of Parexel Consulting, a business unit of Parexel International, will represent ACRO. “ACRO is excited to be a part of this important effort to further enhance the clinical trial process,” said Doug Peddicord, ACRO executive director.

Integrium, a cardiovascular and metabolic CRO, launched Integrium Clinical Excellence (ICE), a metric and performance-driven process designed to consistently deliver actionable results on time and on budget in all of its current and future clinical trial programs. ICE is a series of steps that provide a high level of transparency to Integrium sponsors to allow them to make confident, informed decisions for their clinical trials by minimizing risk factors and maximizing the timely implementation of contingencies to ensure success. “After listening to our sponsors, we realized we can provide more value by further standardizing our processes and especially our feedback mechanisms,” said Eileen McAuley, COO at Integrium. To support the ICE launch, Pierre Devesly joined the company as executive director of clinical operations. He’ll develop metrics and benchmarks. Here’s the press release.

eResearch Technology had a great quarter. Total net revenues jumped to $33.7 million from $21 million during the same quarter in 2007. Profits were up 156 percent. On the Seeking Alpha transcript, Mike McKelvey, president and CEO, said: “We had by far the best quarter ever recorded by eRT with bookings topping $50 million. Importantly, this was not just caused by one or two large contracts, but was rather reflective of a broad increase in new opportunities.” Here’s the release.

Covance won the “Best Contract Research Organization” (CRO) award at the 2008 World Vaccine Congress, held recently in Washington, D.C. As part of the Vaccine Industry Excellence (ViE) awards, the award is designed to highlight the importance of contract research services within the vaccine industry. “This recognition reaffirms our commitment to providing vaccine services that encompass all phases of development,” said Wendel Barr, COO, Covance. Here’s the press release.

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