Blockchain in the Biopharmaceutical Industry
Biopharmaceutical companies and health authorities continuously exchange information to provide safe and effective therapeutics. The interactions between the two require transparency and extensive documentation exchange concerning the processes which extend from the development through the manufacturing phase. The current processes rely on paper documentation, notebooks, and point-to-point electronic data interchange (EDI) for the storage of data. Thereby, generating challenges of data integrity within the internal siloed structures and the traceability of the medicinal products in the pursuit to avoid counterfeiting. With Industry 4.0 and blockchain, the authors envisioned a reinvented workflow that helps to 1) manage data integrity with decentralized trust and 2) improve the track and trace capabilities. Hence, biopharmaceutical companies can manage data in a more trustable manner while maintaining security and privacy, further enabling the external ecosystem with track and trace to ensure complete transparency until the therapeutics reach patients.