Driving the future of health

Operational Complexity Grows in Clinical Trials

Trials don’t stall at recruitment. They stall long before that. Last week at OCT Barcelona, conversations with sponsors, CROs, and sites kept coming back to the same issue: operational complexity across clinical trials continues to grow. More systems. More vendors. More fragmented workflows. More pressure on teams to deliver faster timelines with fewer resources. By the time a study is live, a lot is already locked in. That’s why more teams are focusing earlier in the process: • More deliberate site selection before activation • Bringing patient and community insight in early enough to shape protocols • Reducing administrative burden so teams can focus on delivery One thing that became very clear throughout the week is that teams are not looking for more operational layers. They’re looking for ways to simplify execution and reduce friction across trial delivery. That’s where we’re focused at Research Grid: • A unified, flexible, end-to-end platform designed to work across the trial lifecycle • Fully traceable automation built for safety, compliance, and operational visibility • Technology developed alongside research teams to be practical, easy to use, and reduce bottlenecks in real-world environments Great to reconnect with familiar faces throughout the week and meet new teams along the way. Here are a few moments from OCT Barcelona.

Clinical Research Trends Shifting International Studies

Top Clinical Research Stories from Q1 2026 Clinical research moved quickly in the first quarter of 2026 as regulation, investment, and trial results continued to shape the pace of the industry. In the UK, MHRA reforms are helping speed up approvals and simplify processes. New pathways are being developed for lower-risk studies, while early-stage cell and gene therapy trials continue to grow, strengthening the UK’s position in advanced therapies. Across Europe, the focus remains on coordination and scale. Clinical research continues to contribute significantly to jobs and economic growth, while programs like ACT EU are working to improve how trials are delivered across countries. In the US, several late-stage trials highlighted continued momentum across the sector, including promising psoriasis treatment data and continued progress in gene-editing and vaccine development. The FDA also allowed a paused gene-editing trial to restart following additional safety review. Across Japan and wider Asia, regenerative medicine continues to advance. Early clinical use of iPS cell therapies in Parkinson’s disease and heart failure reflects how the region is positioning itself at the forefront of regenerative research, supported by growing investment across Asia, including Korea. Globally, recent trial results also reflected the balance between progress and risk in clinical development. Positive signals in chronic hepatitis B sat alongside setbacks in oncology, while upcoming neurological readouts, including Alzheimer’s disease, are expected to influence the direction of the market moving forward. At the same time, some of the industry’s biggest operational challenges remain unchanged. Trial timelines are still long, recruitment continues to be difficult, particularly in rare disease research, and increasing complexity across systems and workflows continues to slow delivery. Clinical research is evolving quickly, but progress still depends on how effectively speed, study design, operations, and recruitment come together in practice.

AI in Clinical Research: Automating Data Entry and Saving Time and Money

What does effective partnership in clinical research actually look like in practice? We were at Queen Mary University of London this week for their SME Breakfast, bringing together academia, healthcare, and SMEs, including students and early-career researchers working directly with industry. It was a useful reminder that partnership is about more than transaction. It’s about building relationships around a shared outcome and creating environments where research, technology, and healthcare can work together in practical ways. At Research Grid, we’ve seen that firsthand through our work with Queen Mary University of London and Barts Health NHS Trust. In a large cardiac imaging trial involving more than 600 patients, our AI platform was used to automate one of the most time-consuming parts of research operations: data entry. Thousands of pages of patient records, including handwritten notes, scanned documents, and structured data, were digitized and processed in seconds or minutes, with built-in quality checks and anonymization. The impact demonstrated: • Up to $1.5M in potential data entry savings • 24,000+ staff hours automated • Significant reductions in manual error • 600+ patient records processed in seconds This was not a simulation, but a real clinical environment involving real patient data and operational workflows. The results highlight the potential for purpose-built automation to address structural inefficiencies in research operations, particularly where highly skilled staff are spending large amounts of time on repetitive administrative work. As conversations around innovation continue, our focus remains on implementation: scaling traceable, practical models that move beyond theory to deliver measurable impact in clinical research.

Patient Partnerships Key to Successful Clinical Research

The future of clinical research isn’t built for patients, it’s built with them. At this year’s Patients as Partners in Clinical Research, one message came through clearly across the ecosystem, from patient advocates to sponsors, sites, and CROs: Patient partnership has to start earlier. Not at recruitment. Not after site activation. But upstream in pre-trial planning, site strategy, community engagement, and operational design. When patient voices aren’t integrated early, including in the technology supporting trials, it becomes much harder to design studies that are accessible, representative, and set up for success. That’s why we’ve co-designed our solutions with patients and research stakeholders, involving partners well before study planning begins. It makes a measurable difference. We shared R.grid’s approach for how teams can: • Identify the right sites faster while reducing operational burden • Engage the right patient communities earlier and align stakeholders more effectively • Accelerate recruitment and enrollment while improving patient retention This is grounded in a founding principle we’ve believed from the start: trial success is shaped long before the first patient is enrolled. It was great to reconnect with the PAP community, share progress, and meet new partners. If we missed you at PAP and you’d like to connect, please reach out via our website to continue the conversation.

AI is Transforming Clinical Trials, but the True Potential Remains to be Realized

Research Grid’s latest article explores how these breakthroughs are being implemented across the clinical trial landscape, and shows how purpose-built, AI-native models make research safer, faster, and more precise, tackling common bottlenecks without compromising science.

Research Grid CEO Featured on BBC Radio 4

BBC Radio 4’s The Bottom Line invited Founder and CEO Dr. Amber Hill to share the story behind R.grid with @Evan Davis.

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