Almac Group Collaborates with Exostar

eClinical Application Users Benefit from Single Sign-On Expediency & Enhanced Security

Souderton, PA – Almac Clinical Technologies, part of the Almac Group, the world’s largest privately-held contract pharmaceutical development and manufacturing organisation, today announced a collaboration with Exostar, whose cloud-based solutions help companies in highly-regulated industries mitigate risk and solve their identity and access challenges. The companies are working together to provide Single Sign-On (SSO) and Federated-Authentication access to eClinical applications used to support clinical trials, including Interactive Response Technology (IRT).

In its first eClinical proof-of-concept collaboration with Exostar, Almac successfully integrated its market-leading IXRS 3 IRT with Exostar’s identity and access management platform for life sciences. As a result, Almac’s global client base is set to benefit substantially through simplified credential management for both clinical sites and trial sponsors - ultimately helping to streamline clinical trial workflows. The SSO functionality eliminates the need for site personnel and patients to maintain multiple credentials. When combined with fast credential de-provisioning, the solution enhances the controls and security surrounding trial-sponsor intellectual property. The user-authentication functionality extends to other federated partners of Exostar, including TransCelerate, Merck and AstraZeneca, further augmenting the value of the platform.

“The clinical trials process is dynamic and complex. With IXRS 3, Almac expedites drug discovery by bringing constituents, materials, and data together so the right people have access to the right information and supplies at the right time,” said Kenny Kong, Exostar’s Director of Life Sciences and Health IT. “By federating to the Exostar platform, Almac is furthering the value of their solution by enabling SSO for their clinical application, which eases the access burden on study sponsors, improves the site user experience, and raises the level of security.”

Charlie Morris, VP, New Products & Services – Almac Clinical Technologies commented:

“Protecting sensitive data and securely conducting clinical trial operations are critical functions, yet can prove immensely challenging for sponsors. Exostar’s cloud-based platform provides a perfect solution to enable our clients to overcome these challenges. We’re excited about Exostar’s dedication to streamlining identity management in the highly-regulated industry we work in, and we firmly believe that combining best-in-class technology solutions like IXRS 3 with Exostar’s identity and access management platform for life sciences will inherently unlock new value and reduce burden for the biopharmaceutical clients we serve.

About Almac Group
‘Partnering to Advance Human Health’
The Almac Group is an established contract development and manufacturing organisation that provides an extensive range of integrated services to the pharmaceutical and biotech sectors globally. The services range from R&D, biomarker discovery and development, API manufacture, formulation development, clinical trial supply, IXRS technology (IVRS/IWRS) through to commercial-scale manufacture.

The international company is a privately owned organisation that has organically grown over 40 years and now employs in excess of 4,500 highly skilled personnel. Almac is headquartered in Craigavon, Northern Ireland with operations in the UK, Ireland, across the US (Pennsylvania, North Carolina and California) and in Asia (Singapore and Tokyo).

About Exostar
‘Providing a Trusted Workspace for Secure Business Collaboration’
Exostar, named a Cool Vendor for 2016 by Gartner, offers cloud-based solutions that help companies in highly-regulated industries mitigate risk and solve identity and access challenges. Nearly 125,000 organizations leverage Exostar to help them collaborate securely, efficiently, and compliantly with their partners and suppliers. By offering connect-once, single sign-on access, Exostar strengthens security, reduces expenditures, and raises productivity so customers can better meet contractual, regulatory, and time-to-market objectives. www.exostar.com.