PharmaLedger has had a busy year. After transitioning from a pharmaceutical consortium to a non-profit association, the group launched its first product, Electronic Product Information (ePI). Those product brochures inside a medicine box will soon be a thing of the past. Instead, patients scan the barcode on the medicine box with their mobile phones. In addition to the launch of ePI, the association has attracted 11 new members.

Around the start of the pandemic, PharmaLedger launched as a 29-member consortium to explore blockchain for healthcare innovation. It was originally an EU-funded initiative with a dozen major pharmaceutical companies. Last year, the group decided to continue the work as a Swiss-based non-profit association with paying members.

New members still include many from Europe, but in general there is a more global representation that includes Takeda Pharmaceuticals of Japan and Asian healthcare provider and distributor Zuellig Pharma.

While the announcement mentions 11 new members, it has lost six big pharma companies along the way. Abbvie, Bayer, GSK, MSD, Novartis and Pfizer are current members and have been there from the start. Johnson & Johnson joined in along the way. Looking at the launch of the electronic product information (ePI) product in online videos, it is clear that discussing with large groups of participants is not easy and compromises had to be made. Some decided to go their own way.

However, having broad representation is a key mission of PharmaLedger. So it’s not just about pharmaceutical companies or distributors. Patients, healthcare providers, researchers, and insurers or payers must be involved and all must participate in the development of ePI.

With one product now live, others are in progress, including for clinical trials and supply chain.

“We encourage other clinical trial stakeholders to join us on this journey, to collectively shape a future where data integrity, transparency and collaboration redefine the standards of trust in healthcare and help improve the efficiency of clinical studies and the use of health data,” he said. Stephen Leiper, CEO of Onorach Innovation, a member of PharmaLedger. “This is the future of clinical trials.”