Approaching risk as if life depended upon it

By Samantha Gloede

From mobile healthcare apps that track patients’ symptoms in real time to precise drug dosages for neonatal patients, emerging technologies present limitless potential for life sciences and healthcare organizations. But emerging technologies also pose emerging risks, and companies in the life sciences and healthcare sectors must enable themselves to compete in today’s digital age by building customer trust and delivering technical trust. 

Life sciences and healthcare organizations have their work cut out for them. Healthcare, for example, leads all industries in data breaches, which usually costs 2.5 times more than other industries.[i] Compounding this threat is the lack of proactive measures with only one in three life sciences companies setting up a cyber defense team.[ii] And according to KPMG’s 2019 CEO Outlook, 66 percent of life sciences CEOs believe that their organization is actively disrupting its own sector rather than waiting to be disrupted by competitors.

For the disruption to be successful, customer trust is essential. Lapses in technology integrity and data security can be devastating, costing a company its reputation and bottom line, and potentially costing patients their lives. Modern customers want to be reassured that they aren’t exposed or threatened by technology, and CEOs want to provide that reassurance with 61 percent citing customer trust as one of their top three priorities.[iii]

Reassurance comes in the form of an active management of technology risk. Through a set of considerations—robust testing protocols, mobile device management, encryption, third-party risk management program, and cloud security standards and requirements—leading companies embed technical trust throughout their innovation and products’ lifecycle. This allows them to embrace disruptive technologies and enable innovation that also fosters customer trust.

KPMG

Let KPMG show you how to approach emerging technology risk as if lives depend upon it—because they do. Read Get ready for the future now.

[i] http://advisory.kpmg.us/articles/2017/ethical-compass-automation-age.html

[ii] KPMG Digitalization in life sciences (2018)

[iii] KPMG Digitalization in life sciences (2018)