Faux Partnerships
Obituary For Change Orders?
Using no jargon, an executive from Waife discusses the realities of clinical trial outsourcing in the modern era
Every year, across the globe, hundreds of new companies enter clinical development. Venture capitalists, academic scientists, refugees from big pharma—all of them invigorate and enliven industry science. But awareness of best practices in clinical development isn't always evenly distributed. Certain domains of knowledge (command of a therapeutic area, say) seem to be more comprehensively represented in young companies. That's a concern at Quanticate, a contract research organization (CRO) that specializes in data management and biostatistics. "A lot of these are virtual companies with venture capital backing," says CEO and chairman David Underwood, who sat down with a reporter at the 2012 Drug Information Association annual meeting in Philadelphia. "They have clinical backgrounds. They don't grasp the importance of the biostatistical design and analysis." Rescue Situation In a startup biopharma environment, every dollar, every euro is precious. It can be tempting to allocate limited resources to areas that seem likely to help…more...
