Contract Insights

This blog post was updated on March 3, 2021.

Pharmaceutical and life sciences organizations have a lot on their plate.  Unfortunately, many organizations lack an efficient process to handle a myriad of contracts, clinical trials, promotions, supplies/goods, regulations, and compliance standards.  Consequently, these organizations may leave themselves unprotected from potential increased risk, delays, compliance violations, wasted time, and squandered revenue.  Here’s how to improve life sciences and pharmaceutical contract management with accelerated contracting and compliance management.

Reliable contract lifecycle management software with built-in OFAC search integration tools can streamline and centralize the process of ensuring employee compliance per the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control.  Learn how your organization’s HR personnel can maximize CobbleStone Software’s OFAC search with intelligent national sanction compliance checks and risk analysis snapshots for staff.  Read this helpful blog – written by CobbleStone Software’s very own HR Administrator, Elicia Neumann.

Vendor risk management can be daunting for risk management professionals and financial contract management teams.  In many cases, the process of sourcing a suitable vendor or partner is hard enough on its own.  However, a risk or vendor management professional must also understand a business's requirements and solicit vendors, contractors, and other partners to engage in business with to ensure they are qualified.  Add to the mix the financial responsibility of ensuring compliance under OFAC, or the Office of Foreign Assets Control, from the United States Treasury Department.  Clearly, the duties of reviewing the vendor onboarding process, agreement terms, and clauses can be a time-consuming set of tasks.  Leading contract management software, however, can streamline these processes with seamless OFAC search integration.  Read this blog by CobbleStone's Founder and Executive VP, Mark Nastasi, to learn how.

Electronic signatures are a must to streamline your contract management process.  They allow organizations to create efficiencies that expedite preexisting processes and reduce financial costs.  However, there are still individuals and organizations that question whether or not contract electronic signatures are legal and whether eSignatures will hold up in court.  The question is valid; potential litigation is a serious threat to any organization.  Judicial decisions and legal precedent in the United States have left very little ambiguity on whether or not contract electronic signatures are equivalent to handwritten signatures.  Organizations that use eSignatures should take comfort knowing that the courts have been on their side since 1869.

Institutions of higher education use contracts for many purposes; whether ensuring the delivery of products and services, or fulfilling student, public, or organizational objectives, colleges and universities have a variety of instances where contracts must be utilized. Accordingly, with the overwhelming amount of contracts that these institutions use, it would be beneficial and more efficient for the institution to use contract management software. The benefits of using contract management software are abundant in higher education, but a few key benefits can be highlighted below.

The Physician Payments Sunshine Act was passed by the United States in 2010 in an effort to increase the transparency of the fiscal relationships of drug manufacturers, medical device producers, and biological and medical supplies companies with health care providers.  The institution of the Sunshine Act demanded pharmaceutical organizations with relationships to Medicare, Medicaid, and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) to collect and track data relating to their agreements with entities such as physicians and teaching hospitals. 

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is great if you don’t work in government and believe that, as a citizen, you should be entitled to knowledge of your government’s actions.  On the other hand, if you are a government contract administrator, complying with FOIA can be a time consuming process.  Especially if you are responsible for tracking the seemingly never ending supply of public records or determining if a contract record is, or is not, exempt to FOIA. 

Cyber-security has become a huge concern for businesses today.  More and more organizations are falling victim to cyber-attacks due to improper handling and storage of sensitive data as well as lower security precautions. Our modern dependence on the convenience and connectedness that technology allows has made organizations more vulnerable to security risks. These threats have become so widespread that President Obama issued an executive order earlier this year mandating stricter cyber-security regulations and imposing stricter sanctions on organizations that engage in cyber-attacks that threaten national security and infrastructure.