Two members of our West Coast team, Kira Pillai (Director) and Steven Helm (VP) attended the West Coast PMRC in San Francisco back in June. While the conferences covered multiple topics, the overwhelming theme was definitely AI.
Many companies have presented on this topic as everyone, including RP, is trying to position themselves, and the divide across the industry (both pharma and agency) has become clear.
The advocates tend to view AI as a revolutionary tool that will replace market research as we know it. They talk about the bigger opportunities to implement AI such as using ChatGPT to answer the questions market research has traditionally addressed.
Many presentations (including Steve & Kira’s) focused on ways to utilize AI as part of traditional MR methodologies, particularly in quant research and message testing, as well as ways leverage it for efficiencies in the MR process.
The sceptics push back based on the mindset that while AI can currently provide an answer to most questions, it is not necessarily correct and its reliability is undercut by two reasons: most AI model content comes from public sourcing, leaving it open to bias and the speed at which the answer is provided. As a result, those who are sceptical or not quite sold would lean towards using AI in smaller ways.
Compliance and legal concerns with AI continue to be a hot topic at PMRC, especially in the context of larger applications of AI where large amounts of data, much of which may be sensitive personal information, would be fed into the software to maximize the benefits.
Other topics which came up at the conference included the return of in-person research, considerations when recruiting for rare disease research, integrating MR insights across organizations and patient centric MR.
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