Turning the tide: Javara launches with commitment to transform the clinical research model
Javara is the Hindi word for tide – the rise and fall of which resonated with the company’s founders as analogous to the drug development process. “We have highs and lows on the health care journey. But it is incumbent on all of us to be resilient,” said Jennifer Byrne, co-founder and CEO of Javara.
“The business of Javara is completely focused on how we can better bring people to clinical trials,” she told Outsourcing-Pharma.com. Specifically, it aims to scale and improve the business model and delivery of clinical trials, with a focus on patients at the health care system and individual provider level.
The company’s integrated research organization (IRO) platform will provide “a comprehensive clinical research infrastructure,” including the people, technology, processes, and relationships, Byrne explained. The full service offering looks to augment a health care system’s existing services or add a new clinical research service line of business.
To do this, Byrne said the company has assembled a team of experienced clinical research site experts, while adding new talent and perspective. “We’re building on seasoned experts, but we’re also bringing in high potential new talent that will lead next generation clinical research,” she added.
The company also has assembled a blue-chip board, which Byrne said, “will clearly define that this is not a start up.”
“We have a seasoned expert group of clinical research professionals that are really committed to bring a new transformational model,” she said, “and that’s not just a marketing byline.”
Together with its health care partners, Javara is “embarking on a long-term journey,” Byrne said, one in which the company will affect cultural, financial, and communication changes across the entire health care system.
Turning the tide
Most large health care systems view clinical research and research activities as loss leaders, explained Byrne. “Generally, clinical research business units within health care systems operate in the red; research activities must be financially subsidized by the organization," she said.
“With the ever-increasing economic pressures on health care systems to find new ways to reduce cost of care, while improving patient-centered care and outcomes, scaling clinical research is challenging."
With Javara, Byrne is looking to turn the tide by removing some of the barriers to clinical research.
“Collectively, Javara – and all of us – need to be finding ways in which clinical research becomes much more relevant and impactful," she said, "not only valuable in answering scientific questions for biopharma to gain commercial approval, but rather an expanded value proposition of how clinical research might enhance the patient journey.”
The team at Javara aims to build a “very large and meaningful organization,” Byrne said, one that is transformational – and captures significant market share, making clinical research more relevant for its research partners while building better pathways and partnerships for pharma to bring drugs to market.
Bryne said: “When we have 15m lives that we are providing comprehensive clinical research access to across a handful of healthcare organizations … and 1-2% of those patients participate, we believe this will be a meaningful contribution."
Headquartered in Winston-Salem, NC, Javara launched today at the DIA Global Annual Meeting in Boston, MA.
Joining Byrne on the leadership team is Linda McCarty, JD, LLM, general counsel and privacy officer, Susan Donahue, director of clinical operations, and Mike Albert, financial advisor.
