Landmark study reveals a widening gap between AI ambition and operational readiness

Today we released the 2026 edition of The State of Patient-Centricity in Biopharma, our annual benchmark report examining how teams are navigating the challenges of an increasingly complex specialty pharmaceutical landscape.

The 2026 report is the most comprehensive to date, drawing on responses from more than 170 professionals across 87 biopharma companies, nearly 86% of whom are Director-level or above and over half of whom are operating in rare or ultra-rare disease populations.

The report's central findings are both urgent and clear: fragmented systems and insufficient data infrastructure are no longer just operational headaches, they are creating major gaps across the patient experience. Nearly 60% of biopharma companies say their data is fragmented across systems or fails to inform day-to-day operations. This impedes data access, limits the industry's ability to intervene at key moments, and results in inconsistent experiences. Furthermore, only 9% of teams have reached data maturity levels sufficient to power AI use cases – a striking gap given the industry-wide enthusiasm for AI-driven innovation.

This year's report highlights the divide between data maturity and meaningful AI adoption by company segment. Large and mid-sized manufacturers are more likely to be investing in automation and AI, but even there, governance lags adoption. Only 12% of companies have approved AI tools and formal governance in place, and 20% say usage is informal and employee driven. Meanwhile, small and emerging biotechs remain focused on core patient and provider education, with only 11% listing AI among their top investments.

“AI adoption is inevitable, but that does not mean it’s automatic. The data tells us the real story about where most biopharma organizations currently stand,” said Danny Sigurdson, Founder and CEO of Courier Health. “You can't build the future of patient engagement on a broken foundation. The companies investing in the data fundamentals and right AI partners today are the ones that will define what patient-centricity looks like for years to come.”

The report also documents an accelerating shift toward internal team ownership: the share of internal or hybrid Patient Services teams jumped from 60% to 75% year over year, with Field Access and Reimbursement teams reporting 83% majority internal (up from 79%), signaling a durable change in commercial operating models.

Download the full report for more insights, including interviews with executives from AstraZeneca, Denali Therapeutics, Genentech, Pfizer, and UCB.