The digital revolution has changed the way many global life sciences manufacturers approach quality management. To stay competitive, these companies are switching to cloud-based solutions that enable them to access data faster and easier, while supporting innovation and growth. Protecting this data is also critical and enhanced security is needed to protect data within the enterprise as well as the supplier and partner network.

Existing legacy systems don’t offer this functionality. Let’s consider why a cloud-based quality management system (QMS) alleviates the challenges of traditional quality management and brings the advantage of Industry 4.0 technologies, like Artificial Intelligence (AI).

Making the Case for the Cloud

Why move to the cloud? Some of the more well-known benefits include the fact that cloud-based QMSs are easy to deploy and maintain and they’re also cost effective to implement.

In addition to ease of use and cost savings, cloud-based quality solutions: 

1. Reduce Data Security Risks: Legacy systems increase the risk for data security breaches, a primary concern for life sciences manufacturers. Many companies used to believe that data needed to be within their own four walls for it to be secure. However, with the digital revolution upon us, manufacturers now understand that data is more secure in the cloud.

One reason for this is there’s a greater chance of data breaches when security is managed by small teams. Manufacturers using legacy systems and data behind their own firewalls are limited on how often system penetration testing can be conducted—many test on a weekly or monthly basis.

A cloud-based QMS includes a multitude of people responsible for data security and who conduct daily system penetration testing. In doing so, they can quickly identify and address any security threats and ensure the protection of client data.

2. Provide Greater Visibility into the Data: Quality impacts every aspect of a life sciences manufacturer’s operations. To manage it effectively, organizations need visibility into the data. The challenges here is that many legacy systems often operate in silos. It can be difficult to integrate additional systems, such as regulatory and manufacturing, into these legacy QMSs. This results in limited insights into the data across the enterprise.

Cloud-based solutions provide a flexible option that ease the integration of external systems. This enables manufactures to get insight into the data, in real-time, through use of a cloud-based centralized repository. This data can be accessed quickly and easily to analyze and report on.

3. Provide a Pathway into Quality 4.0: Manual, paper-based systems simply don’t align with Quality 4.0 and hinder digital revolution for manufacturers still using those processes for quality management. To truly transition to Quality 4.0 and benefit from all it has to offer—including achieving proactive quality—organizations need access to enormous amounts of data in real-time and the capability to compile, store and access it quickly and effectively. This isn’t a possibility in legacy QMS solutions.

Cloud-based QMSs seamlessly integrate internal and external people, processes and technology to enable organizations to truly embrace and benefit from the Quality 4.0 evolution. These systems enable life sciences manufacturers to interpret the data in ways never possible before. For example, systems with Machine Learning (ML) analyze every element in all records included in the quality system, regardless of whether it was migrated from a legacy system or inputted into the current solution. The system “learns” as it analyzes the data and provides the user with insights that the human eye would otherwise overlook.

Look to the Cloud for Better Quality Management

A cloud QMS is your guide to the future, opening up tremendous possibilities in the way your organization manages quality. It will enable your organization to align with the latest Quality 4.0 technologies, nurturing both quality and innovation.

We’ve only touched on the benefits a cloud-based solution has for Life Sciences organizations. Learn more about how cloud-based quality management systems benefits Life Sciences manufacturers by downloading the eBook.

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