prologue
In the ever-disrupting fields of data science, life sciences, and analytics, it’s imperative to keep up with the latest industry trends and happenings. Fractal frequently hosts a series of podcasts featuring the mavericks of the data science industry to keep their audience engaged and informed. Sagar ShahFractal Client Partner, Invited Suman GiriGlobal Head of Data Science and Analytics at Merck, in an enlightening conversation on a podcast about the latest trends pervading the field, the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on the pharmaceutical industry, and other burning topics. We talked about
To listen to the Fractal podcast and take notes, here are some excerpts from this conversation in the reader’s own words.
Excerpt from the Fractal Podcast
Sagar Shah: How is the pharmaceutical industry affected by today’s volatile economy?
Suman Giri: Well, not as much as other industries! First, drugs are rather inelastic, with a few exceptions. Demand is not as much a function of purchasing power as it is in other sectors, as people continue to get sick. If anything, as we all know, some pharmaceutical companies have done pretty well because of covid. I heard the SAP index fell 20% in the past week, but the Pharma index he’s up 3%. Merck’s stock is up 30%, which shows how the company is performing in terms of the general economy. Most of the positive investor prospects for us are driven by our strong products and pipeline.
Sagar Shah: How is AI analytics helping drive competitive advantage in the workplace?
Suman Giri: We leverage data science at every stage of the product lifecycle, from research to manufacturing to commercialization. Data science is therefore crucial in understanding the diseases we treat and their prevalence, creating personalized healthcare strategies, and accelerating the design and development of new drugs. For in-line products in the commercial space where we operate, there is a lot of advanced data science going on today, especially for forecasting, calculating commercial marketing effectiveness, reviewing promotional content for compliance, and competitiveness. . In threat analysis and creating personalized engagement strategies to make healthcare professionals aware of drugs and their benefits. There are also several use cases where machine learning and analytics are heavily leveraged, such as automated data matching and rare disease patient discovery.
Sagar Shah: How are you developing your team’s career in AI and analytics?
Suman Giri: We are also thinking about talent retention! Our competitive advantage in the open market is our relentless focus on impact. We know today’s analytics and data science professionals have choices. Every industry and every company needs data science talent, so they can work anywhere. But do you use the skills you have to make bottles more colorful or to save lives? But impact is only one aspect, he also notes, making sure the majority of the talent pool is in flux, moving between different industries and getting enough exposure to the business. I’m trying to make it possible. We are currently partnering with Analytics Vidhya. We also offer growth opportunities in both management and technical tracks. We also encourage participation in many things, such as building accelerators and partnerships with other universities and capstones. I want my workplace to be fun and fulfilling.
Sagar Shah: What challenges are you currently facing in building a successful analytics team?
Suman Giri: It’s mostly talent! Analyzing commercial funds requires both technical and domain expertise. What we’re looking for is a rare unicorn talent pool, people want to feel part of a community, they have a growth map, what they want to work on and how they want to do it. We have a say in what we do. So we take that to heart. Most of our time as a leadership team is spent on how to create structures that enable all these different aspects at scale. I think this is the hard part.
Sagar Shah: What new data sources will help pharmaceutical companies, especially Merck, in the next few years?
Suman Giri: One data source that could be better leveraged is the Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) because we are so focused on their impact. This promotes health equity and ensures our products deliver their intended benefits. So there is a lot of work around it! There is a new structure for tokenization within commercial and syndicated datasets that allows consumer activity to be matched against billing data and LCP engagement data. Companies such as Liebrand and Datavant are active in this space, allowing you to do many more interesting things with your existing data that you wouldn’t normally be able to do. We have also seen a lot of imaging and lab data, even on the commercial side. There are probably use cases that can be addressed through them. Finally, I am very bullish about the prospects and possibilities of synthetic data. This is because it allows scaling in areas where data does not exist and also has privacy implications. In addition to data that can be purchased, purchased and generated, synthetic data is what I am excited about.
Sagar Shah: How will analytics and AI transform the pharmaceutical industry in the next few years?
Suman Giri: I’ve heard about the “alpha fold” work front deep mine. So they tackled this protein-folding problem, which is part of drug discovery, and solved it at scale. Now the next frontier is protein binding, as well as candidate proteins to which drugs can bind. I believe it will be the next holy grail as far as the potential of AI in the pharmaceutical industry, especially in drug discovery. On the commercial side that we represent, there’s a lot of potential to look at the work we’ve been doing over the years in a certain way and use all the new technological advances in AI. All of these advances revolutionize the ways we have hitherto been somewhat inefficient or lacking in precision, taking them to the next level and allowing us to truly make the impact we know we can do. There is a possibility.
Sagar Shah: How was your AI journey over the past decade?
Suman Giri: I studied Data Science and Machine Learning as part of my graduate education and majored in Mathematics. During the thesis, my research focus was on energy decomposition. We focused on taking a single-source multi-channel signal and decomposing it into individual sources. I was looking for an industry where I could use my skills to make an impact. I am passionate about working on meaningful problems and healthcare seemed like a good field to explore. He then moved on to his provider, Highmark, who gave him an excellent perspective on the healthcare ecosystem. I’m moving into consulting for a while in a data science role so I can understand how the industry works. For the past two years I have been working at his Merck because his one industry that I haven’t had enough experience with before is Life His Science is the field I am currently working in. . Improving the U.S. healthcare ecosystem, using data science to do things better for greater impact.
Sagar Shah: What excites you every day?
Suman Giri: Aside from the possibilities of what I do, ensuring that someone gets the treatment they need and extends their life is a big motivator for me. helps. If I had to pinpoint what excites me, it’s the possibility of building and designing scalable systems. The pharmaceutical industry by nature operates in different therapeutic areas, so it’s a system built to ask the same questions in different therapeutic areas and different markets. Working with the smartest people I know to build a system that can truly scale continues to excite me.
Sagar Shah: What trends are likely to materialize in the next 5-10 years?
Suman Giri: Primarily from a privacy-preserving data perspective, this is first-party data, so it has to be Web 3.0. I am a big believer in the promise of Web 3.0. Commercial organizations, especially those that rely on syndicated data, need to adapt how their first-party data strategy is created. The Metaverse is big again. I don’t know if anyone has noticed, but in the next 5-10 years we’ll see the first few concrete use cases. In the next 5-10 years, quantum computing will start facing problems that are impossible with today’s computing power. One of his trends that I am very excited about and root for is that responsible and sustainable AI is becoming more and more part of our conversation and part of the process we follow as we build and scale our use cases. is to become
Suman, thank you for taking the time to share your insight on the pharmaceutical industry. We are blown away by your enthusiasm and can’t wait to see how the Metaverse and AI expand their role in the pharmaceutical industry.
Conclusion
We hope that you have gained an overview of the pharmaceutical industry and how AI is playing a key role in transforming the industry. See our detailed fractal post here. Suman Giri emphasized the importance of data science and how it can help us understand different diseases and create personalized strategies to create medicines to treat them. I’m here. We would love to hear your thoughts on AI, analytics and pharmaceutical industry collaborations. So please comment below and share!
