Research collaboration in the cloud: how NCI and research partners are using interoperable digital identities, digital signatures and cloud computing to accelerate drug development

This paper summarises the pilot study involving government and industry cancer researchers, indicating that the use of interoperable digital identities, digital signatures and cloud computing will accelerate the initiation of a clinical trials, while lowering its costs.

The pilot study demonstrated dramatic time savings for all document flows that require multiple signatures from participants working on or offsite and showed how an all-electronic workflow improves business process flow and the ability of NCI to speed up research.

It states that pharmaceutical companies are highly collaborative and require a constant flow of confidential information with researchers, healthcare providers, and regulators worldwide. Time lost in starting or conducting clinical trials results in substantial financial losses and delays delivery of new therapies to patients.

The SAFE-BioPharma standard and the Federal Bridge Certification Authority (FBCA) use public key infrastructure (PKI) technology to verify identities and to protect information exchanged via the internet.