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  ¡@ CRO stands for ¡§Contract Research Organization¡¨, or alternatively ¡§Clinical Research Organization¡¨. In general, it means a research-oriented organization contracted by pharmaceutical companies or biotechnology companies to provide the various research based services required for new drug development such as non-clinical and clinical experiments, data analysis, law consultations, and other services.


¡@Because it requires 8 to 12 years to develop new drugs from candidate compounds, the costs for drug development can be in excess of US$300 million and pharmaceutical companies are in one of the most risky and profitable businesses known. Nonetheless, among the most attractive reasons to stay in this business, pharmaceutical industry is highly profitable under patented protection. Therefore, R&D timeframe and patented period plays a very critical role in drug development.

¡@ To pharmaceutical companies, the shorter the R&D timeframe is, the longer the patented protection period is. Therefore, reducing the R&D development schedule for new drugs has been a point of major interest in pharmaceutical industry. If a new drug can be released in the market a day earlier, an additional day will be added to the patented protection period and the company can profit from the new drug a day earlier.

¡@ The CRO industry trend has been occurring globally for many years. CRO companies have been serving pharmaceutical companies and biotechnology companies, the medical equipment industry and research organizations, from drug development to marketing. CROs fill the needs of companies with limited resource capacities and keep companies from having to invest heavily in human resources and equipment due to the limitations which occur in certain phases during drug development. In addition, CROs are capable of tracking and analyzing clinical and pre-clinical experiment data in large volumes, and thereby effectively reduce the time required for clinical experiments. ¡@

¡@ Therefore, to bring down budgets, lower labor costs, and reduce drug review periods, outsourcing clinical experiments has become a global trend resulting in a total of more than 1000 CROs globally, and a total value of US$9.8 billions per year. (Courtesy of BIO-ERA)