Suvoda’s Chief Product Officer E.K. Koh and Chief Architect Andrew McVeigh recently sat down to discuss their insights and the technology that is propelling innovation at Suvoda.
With decades of experience driving innovations for multinational and high-growth technology companies, these two experts are combining proven approaches from the high-tech world with Suvoda’s deep clinical trial expertise. The result? An integrated, customizable and upgradable clinical trial platform, developed through practical innovation to meet the needs of today’s increasingly complex clinical trials.
Three big ideas about innovating to design extensible, upgradable platforms for the clinical trial industry came out of their discussion.
Cross-industry collaboration and an openness to change are paramount
As long-time tech industry leaders, E.K. and Andrew bring a vision of what is possible from outside the clinical trial space while carefully considering the uniqueness of the industry. Combining the best of high-tech with the best of clinical trials is what has driven Suvoda’s practical innovation. The new, unified Suvoda clinical trial technology platform aims to do just that. It is consistent with where trial systems are today - in terms of configurability and purpose-built integrations. It is also ready for where they can go — upgradable and efficiently deployed.
E.K. and Andrew attribute Suvoda’s new platform approach to the company’s openness to change, which has allowed for continuous innovation of current processes, systems, and software. “We’ve been able to use the openness of the organization to make our technical vision a reality. Two things that have helped us are the strength of software and openness to change,” said E.K.
The clinical trial industry can benefit from configurable and upgradable platforms
Both E.K. and Andrew clearly see sponsors’ needs for flexible, easy-to-integrate software. Andrew also notes how these same users also want the option to choose between the latest software updates and keeping certain parts of the systems they are familiar with.
Extensibility is the technical concept behind sponsors’ ability to choose. A pioneer in building Internet-scale software platforms with extensible architecture, Andrew explained how extensibility — the mechanism that allows developers and users to create new functions, add-ons, and configurations to a platform without requiring new systems or re-writing the base code — gives users more flexibility to design what they need and forgo what they don’t.
Suvoda's software aims to support extreme customization through a scalable, extensible platform that allows updates to the platform as needed.
“That adaptive level of technical architecture is really important here — the ability to cope with any demand,” said Andrew.
As tech professionals across industries work to build platforms and software that last, extensibility prepares platforms for the future: allowing users more freedom to make their software work for them, on their own terms.
Patients, sites and sponsors deserve a seamless digital journey
With its IRT connected upstream with eConsent and downstream with eCOA, Suvoda is working to evolve its platform to the next level so it can have, as Andrew described it, “an ecosystem of products centered around the coherent patient journey.”
To do this, Suvoda starts from a place of putting themselves in the shoes of the sponsor or site using the technology and the patients who are going through the clinical trial journey.
“It’s about expanding the market and using technologies to get more life-saving drugs approved to help people — that’s the mission,” Andrew said.
Learn more about the benefits of a unified platform