Support Functions

As with all large organisations, pharmaceutical companies need an infrastructure to run them.

Within the pharmaceutical indsutry there are many people who are there to support the work of the scientists and manufacturers, for example:

• Legal experts are involved from ensuring that appropriate patents are taken out for the molecule and the process for making it, to generating contracts for suppliers.
• Statisticians are involved at all stages from ensuring that the animal studies will provide valid results, to monitoring process controls.
• Regulatory affairs pull together all the information that is needed for a medicine to be approved for marketing.
• And, every large company needs departments such as Human Resources, Training & Development, IT and Finance.