Providers suffer from data overload. Agentforce powers Takeda’s digital solution for healthcare engagement.

Takeda has a vision to be a data-driven digital biopharma, that’s why we have a commitment to exploring, testing, and trying new technologies with the ultimate goal of helping influence better patient outcomes. We could have just lifted and shifted our existing customer relationship management (CRM) system, but instead we said, “Let’s take this opportunity to totally reimagine customer experiences. Let’s leverage best-in-class technology to interact with healthcare professionals in a way we haven’t been able to before.” That’s where Life Sciences Cloud better aligned to our aspirations.

What we find valuable in Life Sciences Cloud is that it can bring to life the kind of personalized, data-driven interactions HCPs are asking for. And when you layer in other solutions like Agentforce and Data 360, it really changes the paradigm. Giving our field teams deep insights to personalize their time with a HCP, making those 5 to 15 minutes they get with an HCP as effective as possible.

On average a rep in the field often averages visits up to 15 healthcare professionals in a single day. On top of that, they spent about a day each week on administrative tasks. That’s time not spent with HCPs. But with Life Sciences Cloud, Data 360, MuleSoft, and Agentforce all working together, our aspiration is that reps no longer have to update multiple systems. They’re proactively armed with information before they step into a clinic, so they’re prepared and able to provide relevant information and insights to the treatment decisions healthcare professionals are making right now.

Data Cloud is a key component to our technology architecture. It helps to surface data coming from a variety of different sources, and we use it in conjunction with MuleSoft, our main API store across Takeda, to bring data into our CRM systems. Practitioners don’t just interact with Takeda through one channel. They may speak to a rep, but they’re also reading emails, or even connecting with us on WhatsApp. In the past, that data was locked away in silos. With Data Cloud, we can surface all of it in one place, giving reps a 360-degree view of the customer.

That means when a rep walks into a meeting, they know what the physician’s been researching, what emails they’ve opened, and what questions they’ve asked. Instead of wasting time, it ensures every interaction is the most valued conversation we could possibly have. Data Cloud also structures unstructured data, so AI agents can make sense of it and provide reps with actionable insights that ultimately help healthcare professionals — and patients — get to better outcomes faster.

We're excited about Agentforce helping us understand trends across engagements. Leaders need a complete view of what’s happening across hospitals and across reps. With multiple reps visiting the same healthcare professional, things can get complex. Agentforce gives leadership deep insights at their fingertips — what interactions are happening, what’s resonating, and what the needs are in that environment.

We’re very interested in becoming a data-driven digital biopharmaceutical company. That means we’re looking beyond just knowledge retrieval and having agents support the actual flow of work, making our employees more efficient, saving time, and ensuring compliance.

When you build agents, especially in a regulated industry like pharmaceuticals, you have to be very thoughtful about governance and architecture. The most basic layer for us is what we call utility agents. We’re building a multitude of those, some directly within Agentforce , and some that surface capabilities from other agents through Model Context Protocol integrations with the help of MuleSoft.

The key is making sure they’re architected the right way so that when someone asks a question, the right agent is triggered at the right time. We’ve worked closely with Salesforce and our Platform Architects to put in place best-in-class architecture, because if we don’t design it carefully, our users won’t get the AI functionality required to truly transform customer experiences at Takeda.

Another critical piece is security. An agent should only have access to the data it needs — no more, no less. The governance layer ensures the person asking the question gets only the information they should have access to. Salesforce really helps us make that come to life, putting the guardrails in place for Agentforce to support our business needs.

The pharmaceutical industry is not always well known for being fast. And so any incremental adjustment we can make to drive speed, to help our reps in the field be more efficient, certainly goes a long way.

We are energized by the work that we have ahead of us at the moment. We are on the cusp of important change within our industry, and a massive change happening across the world through the rapid expansion of AI. We can use these technologies to truly transform the way that we interact with healthcare professionals and ultimately the way that they can help to treat their patients.

I have an incredible team. I work with some of the world's best technologists and they're very proud, just like myself, to work at Takeda because we truly get to make a meaningful difference in patients' lives.