Five Reasons Why Life Science Firms are Adopting Firmex
Life science firms, that develop new medical devices or therapeutics, have to follow a rigorous documentation process to comply with a host of FDA regulations. Furthermore, when entering into various corporate agreements these firms are faced with the daunting task of sharing hundreds if not thousands of confidential documents. The types of corporate document sharing projects firms typically have are:
1. Multiple Rounds of Equity Financing
Since most firms are in the development stage, they are almost entirely dependent on investor capital. As a result, the majority of life science firms are either raising capital or preparing to raise capital on a continuous basis.
2. Corporate Partnering
Larger life science firms frequently partner with smaller life science firms to develop new products. The combination of the creativity of small firms with the financial strength, clinical development and marketing expertise of a larger firm is a way firms efficiently bring new products to market. Studies conclude that it is more cost-effective and less risky for established firms to actively partner with smaller firms who may be more efficient at product innovation, rather than to try and develop new products themselves.
3. Divestitures & Acquisitions
Life Science firms will hedge risk with a number of potential candidate products. Some of these will make rapid clinical progress and become the core of the firm’s strategic direction. Selling non-core IP helps a firm generate cash and to focus on core strategy. The acquisition of core IP helps deliver necessary value and pipeline for future financing or partnerships.
4. Executive and Board Reporting
Secure document sharing also applies to internal reporting processes. A common request comes from executives who want up-to-date reporting and are frustrated with delayed access to information. Normally, managers and staff use email to resend documents to various stakeholders, as the documents are often buried in overloaded email inboxes. Furthermore, board members need access to documents from remote locations. By keeping updated key documents online eliminates a lot of unnecessary work and keeps staff abreast of current and key information.
5. Security, Reliability and Accessibility
Locating and reviewing key corporate documents stored on a local file server is neither always accessible nor reliable. Local file servers generally don’t have real-time failover, several weeks of diesel powered generators and multiple-firewalls. In fact, imagine the cost of the worst case scenario (earth quake, fire or flood) in which documentation is lost or near impossible to recover. A lesser disaster could be a hard drive failure and inadequate backup, where documents may be recovered by not in an organized manner. Even if there is an off-site backup file, it can take weeks to re-organize the information. A hosted solution, with tier one security and business continuity standards, eliminates these risks.
About Firmex
Intuitive, affordable, pervasive – thousands of companies choose Firmex Virtual Data Room (VDR) solutions to securely share their highly confidential documents. Leaders in corporate and financial transactions, M&A, compliance, litigation, and procurement value Firmex’s ease of use and outstanding support to profitably accelerate their online document sharing and collaboration projects. More information about Firmex can be found at www.firmex.com.