Life Sciences: Keeping Cell & Gene Therapy Shipments Safe for Patients

‍Introduction

Powered by groundbreaking cell and gene therapy technology, this innovative Boston life sciences company is committed to delivering a new class of differentiated, one-time curative genetic therapies to address a wide spectrum of diseases—providing precise and effective medicines for patients throughout the United States.

The firm recognized that if they were going to spend precious time developing critical, customized therapies for patients, they needed to ensure that those medicines were protected—across the entire cold chain. The supply chain team wanted to learn more about the real-time location and condition tracking provided by Tive’s Solo 5G trackers and cloud platform, so a team member reached out to his contact at Tive.

According to their supply chain Subject Matter Expert (SME), “When you lose a shipment, it is extremely problematic because these shipments are very valuable—both to the patient and to us as a company. Custom medicines can be time-consuming to produce, and we may only have one opportunity to get it right and help the patient.”

Adding GPS tracking capabilities to their critical shipments means this company always knows exactly where their shipments are—from point of origin to point of delivery. If sensitive cargo is misplaced in a warehouse or deviates from an intended route, they can see exactly where the shipment went off course—and their logistics personnel can step in to fix the problem.

“We now use Tive on every shipment.”

From Simple Barcode Scanning to Total Visibility

Prior to using Tive, this company lacked real-time visibility into the movement of their expensive and delicate medicines. They printed barcodes, assigned them to shipments, and scanned them at the start and end of a delivery—but they didn’t know much else. “We weren't using any geolocation services at all. We just scanned the packages like how UPS or FedEx does it. We didn't track location, temperature, or humidity—none of it.”

Because a majority of this company’s shipments travel by air carrier, the air-safe Solo 5G Non-Lithium tracker is the perfect option for protecting their precious cargo.

“Pre-Covid, we had a shipment go missing on the tarmac at JFK Airport. If there had been a Tive tracker on that shipment, we would have been able to track its real-time location in the Tive platform—and we could have protected the cargo.”

Protecting Health: From Lab to Patient

For companies shipping products of any kind, visibility is critical. For life sciences companies, visibility can mean the difference between life and death. Because this biotech firm puts patient health and well-being above everything else, they started requiring that their Logistics Service Providers (LSPs) add location tracking to all customized medicine shipments.

“It is very important that we know exactly where each shipment is—at all times,” says the supply chain SME. “Sometimes shipments are time sensitive, and need to be delivered to a patient within a specific number of hours after the courier picks them up from us. It’s important for us to always know exactly where our shipments are—so we can prepare the receiving side to have the manpower available to get it to the patient.”

“We are in the biotech industry to cure diseases and help patients. Using a product like Tive decreases our losses—and increases the likelihood that medicines arrive safely. That’s extremely important to us.”

Shipping with LSPs They Can Trust

This Boston-based cell & gene therapy firm uses several trusted LSPs, including Biocair, to ship a majority of their direct-to-patient medicines. Biocair has been a Tive customer since 2022—and uses Solo 5G trackers as well as dry ice probes on many life sciences shipments across their customer base.

Says the supply chain SME at the Boston-based biotech firm, “In addition to Tive, we usually include a secondary temperature monitor on each shipment—just in case. Because these secondary temperature monitors are not real time, we use Tive for both real-time location and temperature tracking—because these shipments are so valuable.”

For every shipment, the LSP shares a shipment tracking link with the supply chain team in Boston, which enables him to easily monitor shipments in the Tive platform—which shows the real-time location and condition of their medicines.

Since he joined this biotech firm two years ago, the team has started requiring Tive trackers on more and more of his shipments—making the request from whatever LSP he is using for a given shipment.

“Tive has become the predominant tracking solution in the biotech space—especially within pharma and life sciences.”

End-Customer Communication + Predictive Analytics = Operational Improvements

Not only does Tive help save shipments, the data collected by Tive trackers helps companies make operational improvements—while also improving customer satisfaction. Says the supply chain SME, “Once, we were notified of an extensive weather delay at an airport where a shipment was leaving from. The cargo was coming into Boston, and we needed the contents for an ongoing project.” 

Armed with Tive, the supply chain team can let receivers know whether a shipment will be late—setting expectations before something went wrong. “This enables us to proactively keep the customer informed of deviations, which sets expectations and improves customer satisfaction.”

“Tive is so easy to use; all it takes is a push of a button to start a shipment. Our medicines are so expensive—both in terms of the time spent developing them and the effect they have on someone’s life—and adding a Tive tracker helps keep things safe. Tive gives me tremendous peace of mind.”