Input Stories

Major pharmaceutical companies—including Johnson & Johnson, Merck and Eli Lilly—are working to integrate artificial intelligence tools into a whole host of activities (Business Insider).

• Not only can generative AI help with the development of new treatments and vaccines, but it is also useful for regulatory compliance, marketing, administrative tasks and more.

J&J: “More than 56,000 of J&J’s 138,000 workers have taken a generative AI training course, which is required before any employee is authorized to use the technology,” according to Business Insider.

• “A separate, more in-depth digital boot camp that covers topics including AI, augmented reality and automation has recorded more than 37,000 cumulative hours of training from more than 14,000 employees.”
• “There are so many ways we’ve been using AI,” Jim Swanson, the chief information officer of J&J, told the publication. “But to do that effectively, we had to really create a curriculum and a mindset around upskilling.”

Merck: An early Merck investment in AI included a proprietary platform known as GPTeal.

• “Merck … said that GPTeal gives employees access to large language models such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Meta’s Llama and Anthropic’s Claude while keeping company data secure from external exposures.”
• Meanwhile, generative AI is also helping Merck employees with drafting emails and other documentation—including, for example, regulatory documents required by health authorities (for review by humans, of course).
• “We felt like some of our scientists were taking time being copyeditors,” Ron Kim, senior vice president and chief technology officer of Merck, told Business Insider. “That’s not what they trained for.”

Eli Lilly: Lilly has used AI in researching both small and large molecules, while also employing it to “generate documentation for clinical trials and create materials for regulatory submissions.”

• The company has encouraged workers to regard generative AI as a useful, though nonsecure, tool along the lines of Google.
• “We told everybody you need to use it, you need to start bringing ChatGPT into your work,” Diogo Rau, chief information and digital officer at Eli Lilly, said. However, employees are also told: “Don’t put anything in there that you don’t want to get out.”
• “In 2024, Eli Lilly also encouraged all employees and managers to use generative AI for their year-end reviews,” according to Business Insider. “This year, the company is set to require all senior leaders and managers to obtain an AI certification.”

NAM in action: In light of manufacturers’ embrace of AI, and the many different uses they have for it, the NAM has become a leading advocate of sensible, flexible AI policy on the national level.

• Most recently, the NAM told the White House that it endorsed President Trump’s stated goal of “sustain[ing] and enhance[ing] America’s global AI dominance in order to promote human flourishing, economic competitiveness and national security” while also, in Vice President Vance’s words, “avoid[ing] an overly precautionary regulatory regime.”
• To help policymakers achieve these goals, the NAM supplied a list of steps to be taken, including updating and customizing regulations governing AI and “right-sizing” compliance burdens.