Closing the Insight Gap: AI-orchestrated customer engagement in the life sciences industry

Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping the paradigm of customer engagement in the life sciences industry. This paper investigates how pharmaceutical organizations are evolving beyond legacy customer relationship management (CRM) systems toward AI-enabled platforms that facilitate real-time, personalized interactions with healthcare professionals (HCPs). By embedding advanced capabilities—such as next-best-action (NBA) engines, behavioral analytics, and dynamic journey orchestration—platforms including IQVIA OCE+, Salesforce Life Sciences Cloud, and Veeva Vault CRM are actively bridging the long-standing “insight gap” between data acquisition and actionable engagement.

The analysis is complemented by case studies from Sanofi, Novartis, and Pfizer, illustrating how AI is being operationalized across omnichannel marketing, field execution, and medical communication. These examples reveal measurable improvements in engagement relevance, salesforce productivity, and marketing return on investment (ROI). While challenges persist around data integration, ethical governance, and organizational readiness, the findings underscore AI's emerging role as a foundational enabler of scalable, insight-led engagement across the commercial functions of life sciences enterprises.