Apprentice Welcomes New Investors

  • Published:
    Jun 16, 2020
  • Category:
    Spotlight
  • Topic:
    Industry News

Steadying the Pharma Supply Chain

Intelligent software company for life science manufacturing Apprentice welcomes new investors to scale its solutions that steady pharma supply chains and get critical drugs to market in the wake of COVID-19.

As the novel coronavirus became a global pandemic, travel restrictions, site access limitations and personnel constraints disrupted pharma supply chains and threatened drug production. Apprentice experienced a 15x increase in usage as multiple life science organizations working on potential COVID-19 treatments or vaccines leveraged its software to collaborate at scale while restrictions remained in place.

Bringing a drug to market is an incredibly complex process that requires many stakeholders. The ability of these stakeholders to collaborate in the lab or manufacturing suite has been exceptionally difficult due to the pandemic. Apprentice site deployments have increased 6x since March due to its ability to provide a secure platform for pharma teams, subject matter experts, suppliers, FAT-SAT sites and contracted partners to connect and troubleshoot remotely, moving product development along efficiently.

Mitigating the COVID Disruption

While many manufacturing teams continue to work diligently to deliver COVID-19 treatments, everyday lifesaving products must still be brought to market as well. Those teams also rely on Apprentice solutions to ensure supply chain preservation since COVID-related manufacturing delays would create a chain reaction that could impact millions of patients in need of cancer treatments, diabetes medication, statins and others. Apprentice’s intelligent software alleviates that pressure.

Life science teams use Apprentice to execute smart procedures and collaborate in real time.

“We immediately reassured our customers that we’re here to help them not just survive COVID but to thrive, even at a time when it seems almost impossible,” said Angelo Stracquatanio, CEO and co-founder of Apprentice.

Apprentice’s mission to support the life science industry caught the interest of global venture capital and private equity firm Insight Partners, which invested $7.5 million to help scale the company’s mounting efforts.

“With the global pandemic ongoing, it is imperative for life science organizations to utilize technology and intelligent software to collaborate effectively and bring lifesaving drugs to patients in need at a faster pace,” said Nikhil Sachdev, Managing Director at Insight Partners. “Apprentice has developed a suite of regulatory-compliant solutions utilizing AI and machine learning to help companies streamline and speed up pharma manufacturing processes to ultimately help patients battling serious illnesses from COVID-19 to cancer. We are thrilled to partner with the Apprentice team as they continue on this important mission.”

An End-to-End, Regulatory-Compliant Life Sciences Manufacturing and Collaboration Solution

Apprentice’s solutions include a regulatory-compliant intelligent software platform for life science manufacturing and an augmented-reality, language-independent, collaboration tool.

Apprentice’s intelligent software platform is an end-to-end solution for batch execution, augmented procedures, guided workflows, predictive resource management, event tracking and immersive training. The platform is enhanced with AI, machine learning and augmented reality, taking organizations beyond digitization and rapidly moving them into a new world of smart manufacturing. As a result, life science teams increase their speed to market, improve yield per batch and reduce deviations.

Their AR-enhanced remote collaboration tool Tandem allows organizations to communicate and troubleshoot remotely over a secure virtual platform. Subject matter experts can assist in-suite operators during critical moments so that sensitive project timelines are maintained while contracted partners and suppliers around the world can connect remotely to ensure that a drug product is transferred correctly between locations.

With facility access limited to key personnel, pharma teams are using Tandem and compliant, hands-free headsets to troubleshoot in real time with remote vendors for required maintenance performance or during unforeseen equipment failures that threaten further delays. In addition, facility tours and inspections that have largely been suspended due to the pandemic can resume on a remote basis, accelerating approvals during a time when site access is extremely limited.

Rapid Deployment Kits

Apprentice has been shipping Rapid Deployment Kits to customer sites around the world, offering out-of-the-box intelligent software and collaboration solutions. Kits arrive pre-configured giving customers the ability to start using the product immediately, allowing them to use augmented reality and intelligent tools to execute smart procedures, collaborate in real time, and perform remote reviews/approvals that streamline and speed up processes directly related to essential drug production.

“Critical treatments and products can’t wait,” Stracquatanio said. “We’re committed to doing whatever it takes to help the life science industry succeed during this global crisis.”

The New Jersey-founded company supports Fortune 100 clients in life sciences and other complex, compliance-driven industries across the U.S., Asia, South America and Europe.