Veeva encouraged to tap CRO industry after inVentiv puts head in the cloud

26-Nov-2014 - Last updated on 26-Nov-2014 at 14:49 GMT

inVentiv signed a deal to use Veeva's cloud-based clinical trial management software in October

Veeva Systems has reported a robust Q3 strengthened by increasing interest in its cloud-based clinical trial management software and a deal with inVentiv Health.

Two years after launching the cloud-based regulated content management system Veeva Vault, the California-based company has announced it has surpassed 100 customers attributing to a 52% jump in sales for the first quarter fiscal year 2015 year-on-year.

Vault hosts a number of tools to assist pharma and biotech, in organising and processing R&D documentation - including cloud-based electronic trial master file (eTMF) and regional submission system for clinical trials, and Vault QualityDocs for managing quality and manufacturing SOPs – but CEO Peter Gassner said having contract research organisations (CROs) on the books is testament of the efficiency of such technology.

“The CROs are important, whether they're growing incrementally or shrinking incrementally, they're doing almost half of the clinical trials on behalf of the life sciences industry,” he said. In October inVentiv Health Clinical became the first of the top eight CROs to choose Veeva’s clinical product (in this case the eTMF package), and Gassner said this could encourage more key players to come on board.

“We have about a dozen CRO customers today and each time a CRO chooses Vault, it's kind of extra important because the reason that the CROs exist is to be able to run these trials more efficiently, more cheaply and more quickly than their companies could do themselves,” he said. “They make a technology choice [and] that contributes to their competitive advantage.”

Tthe total number of “Vaults” utilised by Veeva customers had grown threefold over the past year, and within the past quarter the company added a third Top 10 Pharma client, an emerging biotech, as well as inVentiv.

Technology innovation driving growth

For the three months ending October 31, Veeva reported total sales of $84m (€67m), while net income clocked in at just over $10m, up 57% on the same period last year.

During the call, the firm was asked whether demand and sales were up due to companies with fully depreciated legacy management systems. While Veeva’s President Matt Wallach said this was a continual driver across the industry and for Veeva’s products, Gassner added changing technology was also a key factor.

“I think the momentum is caused by this [cloud-based software] being the first major technology innovation in content management for life sciences [in the past 10-15 years],” he said.

“It's the technology innovation that's really driving our growth.”