Globally, market access has drawn a lot of attention as nations struggle to control their rising healthcare costs amid the international economic downturn. Governments have responded by implementing more stringent guidelines for the approval of new products. As a result, pharmaceutical firms are having a harder time addressing the unique issues brought up by diverse governmental, regulatory, and stakeholder entities.
The demand for market access services is growing, particularly in developing nations where the complicated and changing healthcare system makes it difficult to get products approved and used. Additionally, emerging markets are currently the primary drivers of growth, making success in these areas crucial for the bulk of pharmaceutical businesses.
Due to greater awareness among regulatory and reimbursement authorities of the requirement for value above existing therapies, the market access role has progressively grown in relevance in developed economies. Pharmaceutical businesses have started to integrate the market access function within the organisation in order to deal with this shifting regulatory environment. Only a small number of businesses, however, now have a market access team with well-defined roles and duties. As a result, the majority of pharmaceutical firms today have a fragmented strategy, with sales, marketing, and regulatory departments each handling a portion of the market access duties.
A pharmaceutical business will need a complete market access strategy to thrive in such complicated areas. This has to be tailored to meet local difficulties and tightly connected with other business operations. In contrast to established countries, the healthcare environment in developing nations is complicated and lacks a formalised medication approval procedure. For interacting with a wide range of stakeholders during market access, there are many different procedures and activities involved.
The essential success characteristics that a business must implement in order to get easy market access are as follows:
- Comprehensive market reach plans that start with product development
- Fostering efficient communication across various corporate areas (such as sales, marketing, regulatory, etc.) in order to foster a culture of teamwork
- Teams with a focus on managing stakeholders, such as Key Account Management (KAM)
- Using an integrated approach to stakeholder management
- A deeper comprehension of the connection between stakeholders and market access
- Cooperation with internal and external stakeholders effectively
- Establishing ideal procedures, strategies, and, most crucially, personnel