Drugmakers tout AI efforts at conference amid US tariffs concerns

The rising adoption of artificial intelligence in the pharmaceutical industry dominated discussions at a conference in India this week, while executives largely preferred to wait for more clarity on US President Donald Trump's tariff threats.

Drugmakers such as Amgen and contract manufacturers including Parexel highlighted AI's role in reducing the time taken to conduct certain parts of the trials.

US-based Parexel said it was piloting an AI model to generate drug safety reports 30-45 minutes faster than the manual process. The AI-generated reports are then verified by an expert.

AI can help halve the cost and time taken to develop a drug, from discovery through commercial production, compared to the traditional process, said Chaitanya Royyuru, partner at consulting firm EY. Royyuru estimated that the process currently takes more than 10 years and costs about $1 billion.

Discovering new molecules and drug repurposing, or using a drug for a condition outside of its approved indication, are other areas where AI is being utilized, executives said.

Beyond drug discovery processes, AI is also being used in medical image reading, where it is able to assist doctors in finding anomalies.

"Sometimes, when we look at an X-ray and we think it's normal, but AI says look, there's a small cancer you're missing," said Nageshwar Reddy, chairman, Asian Institute of Gastroenterology.

"And when we actually look at it very carefully and follow the patient, there's a cancer coming there," Reddy said.

Ken Washington, chief technological officer, Medtronic, said, "The bottom line is that AI has to be everybody's job."

Wait and Watch on Tariffs

Trump's plans to levy tariffs on pharmaceutical imports had cast a shadow over the two-day conference as India is among the top exporters to the US, especially of cheaper versions of popular drugs.

However, drugmakers including Dr Reddy's said they were still waiting for clarity on the tariffs.

"Right now, it's wait and watch. There is no clarity on what the tariffs are, if any, or if there is a transition period," said Nandini Piramal, chairperson at Piramal Pharma, which provides contract manufacturing and development services.