HCL Technologies enters clinical research market in Australia with Novotech deal

HCL Technologies today signed a deal with Novotech, the largest independent clinical research organisation in Australia, to implement Oracle's Siebel clinical trial management system (CTMS) over the next few months.

The deal comes close on the heels of HCL Technologies' significant engagement with pharmaceutical company Merck & Co, the company said in a statement.

"HCL has an excellent track record working with pharmaceutical companies globally and our partnership with Novotech further fortifies HCL's life sciences presence in Australia. With more than 2,000 professionals servicing the ANZ region and a broad set of global, multi-vendor capabilities HCL will help Novotech to become more agile in today's competitive environment," said Virender Aggarwal, executive vice president for APAC & MEA, HCL Technologies.

The Siebel CTMS will support Novotech's complete spectrum of clinical trial management services across Asia Pacific. Siebel CTMS will serve as a centralised repository to collect and track relevant information about clinical trials at different tiers - local, regional and global.

HCL Technologies will work with Novotech in phases, starting by assessing the company's current proprietary clinical trial management system and providing a benchmark for where the system should be in terms of scalability and flexibility. HCL will then implement and validate the Siebel CTMS and provide training to enable Novotech in using the CTMS successfully.

"Novotech has selected HCL to be its implementation partner in this process due to its extensive experience in the life-sciences industry. HCL is a reliable IT partner for many pharmaceutical and biotech organisations across the world and comes with the right mix of business and system experience to serve our requirements," added  Alek Safarian, chief executive of Novotech.