When Key Opinion Leader (KOL) data lacks centralization and medical teams rely on manual, static lists, they miss key opportunities to build relationships and bring new treatments to market. Without a dynamic, unified view of expert activity, critical scientific discussions are missed, product launches are delayed, and potential market growth is left on the table.
To break through these roadblocks, Thermo Fisher Scientific abandoned outdated point-solutions in favor of Veeva Link Key People. By establishing a single, real-time view of global healthcare professionals, the team unlocked immediate, measurable value:
- Accelerated Market Expansion: Thermo Fisher Scientific unlocked previously unknown researchers in new markets, successfully proving market demand and enabling targeted engagement at international congresses.
- Timely, Relevant Outreach: Automated activity tracking surfaced dynamic shifts in expert focus, allowing teams to execute personalized engagement at precise moments.
- High ROI: Deliverable value significantly outweighed platform costs by trading administrative friction for sharper strategic execution.
- Labor Savings: Replaced time-consuming manual searches with automated data aggregation, freeing up resources for core strategic priorities.
“By eliminating manual KOL research, our team now focuses on core strategic initiatives. When you add up the labor savings and our sharper strategic focus, the cost of Link Key People is miniscule in comparison.”
Gary Falcetano
Senior Manager, Global Medical and Scientific Affairs, Thermo Fisher Scientific
The Cost of Fragmented Data
Thermo Fisher’s medical affairs teams previously struggled to keep pace with expert activity. Relying on disconnected systems and ad-hoc searches slowed down engagement, stalled scientific exchange, and delayed market readiness. Falcetano explained, “it wasn’t that the data didn’t exist; it just lived in disparate systems and was inconsistently accessible to our teams. This created a lot of process-friction and just decreased our overall effectiveness.”
Trading Administrative Burden for Strategic Execution
To resolve these inefficiencies, Thermo Fisher Scientific partnered with Veeva MedTech to leverage Link Key People – a curated KOL intelligence platform that aggregates global scientific, clinical, and digital data into one unified dashboard.
Link Key People empowered Thermo Fisher with:
- Comprehensive KOL Insights: Centralizes publications, clinical trials, professional associations, and conference presence in one profile.
- A Standardized Prioritization: Replaces outdated CVs and anecdotal PubMed searches with critical, real-time data to help rank engagement priority.
- Deeper Expert Engagements: Reallocates hours previously wasted on administrative research toward high-impact medical initiatives and relationship building.
Turning Real-Time Intelligence into Market Demand
In addition to streamlining workflows, the platform provides actionable insights that directly influence commercial success:
- Proving Market Demand: When regional feedback suggested lack of demand for a new diagnostic assay, medical affairs used Link to uncover 100+ active researchers in that niche, paving the way for targeted outreach to inform business strategy.
- Surfacing Hidden Opportunities: Dynamic tracking alerted the team when a top KOL published on an unexpected topic outside her usual scope, prompting timely and relevant outreach.
“Link Key People helps us identify, prioritize, and engage the HCPs and KOLs that really move the business forward,” says Falcetano.
Sustaining Momentum Across the Enterprise
Unifying their KOL data strategy enabled Thermo Fisher Scientific to maximize impact while curbing operational spend. Looking forward, the medtech is applying these learnings to future initiatives – continuing to prioritize a platform-first architecture to support medical excellence.
