The need for an application network at Pfizer
As the world’s third largest manufacturer and distributor of pharmaceuticals, Pfizer, and its IT team, operate at a massive scale. The company drives over $50B in revenue across over 600 different product lines, and sells products in approximately 175 markets with over 60 manufacturing plants and countless R&D partner institutions. Today, IT plays an increasingly vital role in helping the business to manage the massive size and complexity of its business operations.
Pfizer (and indeed all pharmaceutical companies), is not unlike manufacturing or consumer goods companies. They face increasing pressure to digitize processes supporting product development, and to expand the use of digital channels to support how they bring these products to market. They must then bring these products to market across a variety of geographies and through a number of distribution channels. And in doing so, they must streamline internal operations in a way that combats downward price pressures. The unique product, go-to-market, and regulatory complexities that come part and parcel with the pharmaceutical industry compound these business requirements.
This complexity at the business process level has created a corresponding complexity for IT. As a result of these initiatives, Pfizer’s IT team had faced an explosion of IT initiatives — whether it be from a growing number of stakeholders and partners supporting a business process, or a growing number of applications, data, and devices which must be connected. As we will demonstrate below, integration emerged as a focus area that Pfizer depended on to bring new products to market faster and to meet evolving customer needs.
To read full download the whitepaper:
From projects to platform: How Pfizer built an application network to accelerate innovation
