Novartis picks Qualcomm tech to enable remote collection of trial data

Qualcomm president Derek Aberle

Novartis ($NVS) has added another component to its "Clinical Trials of the Future" program. The latest element of the trial efficiency initiative sees the Swiss Big Pharma team up with computer chip maker Qualcomm ($QCOM) to gather data on clinical trial participants between visits to the investigator site.

Qualcomm Life, the chip maker's health-focused subsidiary, is providing its 2net platform to Novartis to enable the collection and aggregation of medical device data. Novartis will use the cloud-based platform to pull in data from an array of medical devices, giving it a way to continually monitor the biometrics of clinical trial participants. Qualcomm has been working toward such an arrangement with a Big Pharma company for the past decade.

"Healthcare is an area that we've spent a lot of time on over the last 10 years. And up to the last few years, the industry wasn't ready to start really adopting mobile technology. But now we're seeing a transformation in mobile health. The medical devices and technology needed for those devices has really matured and come to a place where the solutions are there, and they really work well," Qualcomm President Derek Aberle said in his CES 2015 keynote speech attended by mHealthNews.

Novartis is already using 2net in a clinical study. The trial is assessing the use of medical devices by people with chronic lung disease, a field in which Novartis has filed two U.S. marketing applications in the past week. The trial isn't looking at any Novartis drugs, but is instead evaluating the use of smartphones and 2net hubs to collect data from medical devices. Such remote data collection could cut down on costly and inconvenient site visits, while giving drugmakers additional biometrics.

- here's mHealthNews' piece
- read Forbes' article
- and the press release