The adoption of cloud is revolutionizing healthcare.

As each research facility, pharmaceutical company or hospital moves its data into secure cloud storage, the disparate pieces of information, from patient details to research study results, are being freed from their siloed systems to be securely shared across the globe.

“We don’t necessarily believe the digital transformation is just about our own enterprise,” said Leo Barella (pictured, right), vice president and chief technology officer of Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. “That is definitely a fundamental, but the digital transformation is truly about connecting Takeda as a digital pharmaceutical company to the overall healthcare ecosystem.”

Barella and Don Heiliger (pictured, left), managing director at Accenture PLC, spoke with John Furrier, host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio, during the AWS re:Invent Executive Summit. They discussed how the Accenture AWS Business Group helped the two-hundred year old pharmaceutical research group digitally transform, noting the impact data has for healthcare research and operations. (* Disclosure below.)

Takeda harnesses its digital pharmaceutical power

Becoming data-centric has enabled Takeda to transact with its partners in real time; patient records and research can be shared more efficiently, which sometimes makes the difference between life and death. Evolving their digitization trend is the application of artificial intelligence to the research process, as well as automating everyday healthcare tasks.

Takeda recently announced plans to reduce time to diagnosis and improve care for patients with rare diseases. One of the company’s commitments is to “improve the clinical landscape around rare diseases through data standardization.”

Speaking on Takeda’s mission to discover new medicines for rare diseases, Barella said, “It’s quite exciting because it’s the application of artificial intelligence, machine learning, where … we’re now actually connecting them to a cure that is drastically changing their lifestyle.”

Patient data collection is another area of interest in Takeda’s digital revolution. An example is the Nurseline initiative for plasma donors. Plasma is essential for pharmaceutical research. But it can’t be synthesized, so the supply chain relies on human donations. In the past, donors had to contend with “a lot of paperwork,” according to Barella. This added to an already lengthy and arduous process. Now, thanks to AWS technology, the registration process is automated.

“If you have ever experienced going into an Amazon Go [store], where you walk in, you get some groceries and walk out and don’t pass through the register, it’s the same type of an experience that we want to provide,” Barella said.

While the purpose of Nurseline is to streamline the plasma donation process, the concept can be replicated across the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries, according to Barella. Simplifying the paperwork process would remove a huge burden from patients, administrative staff, nurses and doctors. It can also be used to create communities by connecting people suffering from rare diseases and allowing them to compare symptoms and treatments.

Merging Takeda’s traditional research and modern data goals, Nurseline is a clear example of how the management philosophy and culture of cloud can change not only business but society. This allows refactoring and reconfiguring existing resources in a way that creates value and even saves lives.

“We’ve been a pharmaceutical company for the past 240 years, and now we’re starting to become a digital pharmaceutical power,” Barella said.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the AWS re:Invent Executive Summit. (* Disclosure: This segment was sponsored by Accenture PLC. Neither Accenture nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.

Photo: SiliconANGLE