QuickConversations: Keeping Business and Life Moving

Communications, Expectations & Hidden Heroes

In part 1 of our two-part series, “FROM CLINICAL TRIALS TO COMMERCIALIZATION: THE PHARMA-HEALTHCARE GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAIN,” we discussed what’s required to maintain a successful global supply chain—one that can include life-changing and life-saving shipments.

In this episode of QuickConversations we’re joined by a guest podcaster from our parent company, Kuehne+Nagel:  Robert Coyle, Senior Vice President of Pharma & Healthcare Strategy. Also joining us again is QuickSTAT’s Scott Ohanesian, Senior Vice President Operations, Clinical Trial Logistics. Together they represent the end-to-end planning and execution of the pharma product life cycle process.

Now, in part 2 – “COMMUNICATIONS, EXPECTATIONS & HIDDEN HEROES” – we dig deeper into supply chain planning and strategy, specifically the critical role that clear, frequent communications plays. We’ll also hear what it takes to move urgent, life-critical cell & gene therapies to and from patients – as well as to help manage some of the most important clinical drug trials of our time.

One Quick ask before we begin this second of our two-part series with Rob and Scott. If this podcast inspires a question for Rob or Scott, please reach out to them! Go to quick.aero/podcasts and click on the “Ask The Podcasters” link. And if you’d like a transcript of the conversation, you also can download a copy on this page as well. Or visit Kuehne+Nagel’s website at kuehne-nagel.com and search for “podcasts.”

From Clinical Trials to Commercialization: The Pharma-Healthcare Global Supply Chain

The Pharma & Healthcare global supply chain is an extensive and urgent one. As we’ve all seen from the Covid-19 vaccine response, the line from clinical trials to final delivery of medicines and drugs into the marketplace, connecting scientific labs, patients, manufacturing sites, distribution centers and ultimately, patients requires careful planning, coordination, and execution. Any misstep in temperature controls, delivery times, aviation and ground transportation and more can cause delays and even lives.

Of course, this vital supply chain existed before Covid – and it exists today outside of Covid, delivering myriad life-saving gene and cell therapies and drugs.

So what is required to maintain this global lifeline? What planning and strategy are needed for it to endure? How should various players communicate and coordinate – and how can we be best prepared when unexpected events call for immediate shifts in plans?

Helping to answer all of these questions —and more— are Robert Coyle, Senior Vice President of Pharma & Healthcare Strategy at Kuehne+Nagel and Scott Ohanesian, Senior VP Commercial Operations, Clinical Trial Logistics at QuickSTAT. Together, Rob and Scott’s collective expertise covers the entire end-to-end planning and execution of the process. That’s because in addition to QuickSTAT’s 24/7 logistics and transportation solutions, Kuehne+Nagel covers more than 1,300 locations in over 100 countries, delivering Sea, Air, Road, and Contract Logistics – with a clear focus on integrated logistics solutions.

One Quick ask before we begin our first of two episodes on the topic, this one addressing “Clinical Trials to Commercialization: The Pharma &Healthcare Global Supply Chain.” If this podcast inspires a question you might have for Rob or Scott, please reach out to them. Go to quick.aero/podcasts and click on the “Ask The Podcasters” link. And if you’d like a transcript of the conversation, you also can download a copy on this page as well. Or visit Kuehne+Nagel’s website at kuehne-nagel.com and search for “podcasts.”

Next-Gen Tech: Connecting Aviation Companies to Their Global Supply Chain

A strong supply chain depends – among other keys – on real-time information, communications, and technology – keeping all of the stakeholders throughout the supply chain continuously in sync.

Today our focus is aviation. And we’re going in depth on one of the keys to keeping the aviation global supply chain logistics on track: Technology. That’s because we’re launching a new Quick Online 2.0 – customized for aviation – to meet aviation’s unique supply chain needs.

We’re all, we hope, on the road out of the pandemic as vaccines come down the line. So how can this tool help the aviation industry as it comes out of the pandemic? Specifically, what are the industry trends and requirements that technology needs to address? What does it take in terms of providing transparency of shipment status and targeted communications, leveraging GPS data, and much more – all seamlessly connected to all stakeholders of the supply chain in real-time?

To address those questions, we have Michael McNally, The Quick Group’s Vice President of IT Product Management. Steve Wilson is Vice President of Strategic Accounts at Sterling Global Aviation Logistics. They’re part of the team releasing the next generation of Quick Online, the company’s leading software for clients to manage their global logistics projects, and a key component of the technology backbone that keeps business moving.

To learn more about Quick’s global logistics solutions, go to quick.aero/podcasts.

Quick IT Roundtable (Part 2): The Show Must Go On

Among the many business lessons that moved from the back pages to headline news during the pandemic: The complexity and importance of maintaining global supply chains – the lifeblood for all of us from healthcare to biotech,  aviation to high-tech and beyond – helping move products, aircraft parts, and even life-saving cell and gene therapies. Also in the spotlight: The sophisticated technologies required to keep each part of the global supply chain seamlessly active and secure.

In Part One of our Quick Group IT Roundtable – “Business Continuity Takes Center Stage” – we explored what it takes to maintain cutting-edge technologies and 24/7 supply chain service requirements during a pandemic. 

Today in Part Two, “The Show Must Go On” we go further, gaining best practices from The Quick Group’s technology  professionals  learning what all of that back and front-end expertise means for clients. And doing this while constantly pushing for continuous improvement which is – in the words of one of our panelists– “constant and never-ending.”

These panelists are all part of The Quick Group IT team, who support the company's four business units -- Sterling Global Aviation Logistics, Quick Specialized Healthcare Logistics, QuickSTAT Global Life Science Logistics and Quick Specialty Logistics. The four technology leaders who joined our dynamic virtual roundtable included:

• Eric Bischoff, Chief Information Technology Officer
• Michael McNally, Vice President of IT Product Management
• Ed Wendell, Director of User and System Support Documentation Training
• Bob Rottinger, Director of IT Infrastructure and Compliance

We began by asking Eric Bischoff about the best practices that remain top of mind for him following so many months of the pandemic.

To learn more about Quick’s global logistics solutions, go to quick.aero/podcasts.

Quick Group IT Roundtable: Managing a Crisis on the Global Stage

As we know, the Covid-19 pandemic impacted nearly every aspect of our lives. And as every business had to reinvent operating procedures on the fly, the goal was the same: Maintain operations, serve clients, stay safe.

And when managing global supply chains for clients in nearly every continent, that’s a lot to reinvent on the fly. And behind it all: The technology: Customer apps, internal operations, and – all of a sudden – a work-from-home employee base. One that still needs to maintain the extraordinary service levels and business continuity that clients who depend on a seamless global supply chain require for mission-critical and life-saving logistics.

So for The Quick Group, what did it take to ensure all aspects of its back and front end technology were in place to keep clients and supply chains secure? How much of it was some version of the old motto – Be Prepared – and how much meant leveraging internal experience and creativity to solve the inevitable obstacles that a global pandemic throws at you.

To find out, we hosted a dynamic virtual roundtable with four of The Quick Group’s technology leaders, who support the company's four business units -- Sterling Global Aviation Logistics, Quick Specialized Healthcare Logistics, QuickSTAT Global Life Science Logistics and Quick Specialty Logistics. They include:

• Eric Bischoff, Chief Information Technology Officer
• Michael McNally, Vice President of IT Product Management
• Ed Wendell, Director of User and System Support Documentation & Training
• Bob Rottinger, Director of IT Infrastructure and Compliance

In fact, the conversation was so filled with insights, best practices, and actionable guidance for clients, that we broke the conversation into two parts.

To learn more about Quick’s global logistics solutions, go to quick.aero/podcasts.

From IT to FI – Global Logistics Solutions for Mission-Critical Logistics Needs, with Mike LoRusso

Mike LoRusso, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Quick Specialty Logistics, joins for his second QuickConversations podcast. In this episode, Mike shares the wealth of knowledge that comes from a career in both financial and logistics management. He fully understands the urgency of high-tech and IT services -- whether it’s a component that needs to be immediately replaced or a data center moved. In this program, he covers it all – and just what it takes to deliver finely-tuned technology logistics.

To learn more about Quick’s global logistics solutions, go to quick.aero/podcasts.

Logistics That Fuel Your Global Aviation Supply Chain, with Claus Engelbrechtsen

Before we start this episode of QuickConversations, we wanted to provide a bit of background about the content. This program was recorded in New York back in February of this year – shortly before the COVID-19 outbreak started to wreak havoc on the city, the nation, and the world.

And as we know, as the pandemic spread worsened, so did its impact on businesses of all types – with the aviation industry worldwide hit particularly hard.  From cancelled flights to travel restrictions, to self-quarantine mandates and more, the pandemic continues to take its toll on the industry.

The Sterling Global Aviation team is working with clients to meet their global logistics solutions today and going forward, as we evolve to a “new normal.”

We’ll be recording additional episodes of QuickConversations to focus on what lies ahead – but in the meantime, we hope you find this discussion with Sterling’s Claus Engelbrechtsen informative and insightful, as he shares what it takes to deliver the logistics solutions that fuel your global aviation supply chain.

To learn more about Quick’s global logistics solutions, go to quick.aero/podcasts.

Life Science Logistics: A Matter of Technology, Temperature & Time, with Paul White

Of all the logistics required to maintain efficient and exact global supply chains, temperature requirements surely are among the most fascinating: Ship something that absolutely must remain as cold as 196 degrees below zero Celsius across the world? Or how about a shipment that can’t go any lower than 15 degrees Celsius while simulatenously and precisely never heating above 25 degrees Celsius? They involve extraordinary logistics planning, tracking the temperature in every step throughout transit and using the latest innovations in packaging – a new world scientific and technological update to the old world’s simple box.

But for Paul White, Executive Vice President of QuickStat, it’s only one of many challenges he has seen in some 35 years in logistics and sees today across the aviation and life sciences sectors including the importance of strategically located conditioning facilities to help shorten delivery times of temperature-sensitive products. How to integrate emerging client requirements with new technologies to speed deliveries and improve efficiencies? Or how keep global supply chains moving not just during anticipated crises – like bad weather or Brexit deadlines – but also during ones no one knew were coming: Like the Icelandic volcanos 10 years ago or the coronavirus today?

A note on timing and location: We caught up with Paul in the UK, as Brexit was dominating the news and coronavirus was emerging. To learn more about Quick’s global logistics solutions, go to quick.aero/podcasts.

Life Science Logistics in a Life-Changing World, with Scott Ohanesian

As the COVID-19 crisis continues its dramatic impact on lives globally, in the life science space, patients who are being treated for non-COVID-19 illnesses still need to receive their treatments – even during a pandemic. Clinical trials must move forward. And medical supply chains have to be kept intact.

What’s more, while the virus rages, many companies around the world have quickly switched their focus to the development of a COVID-19 vaccine. The usually fast-paced world of life science logistics is now moving ever faster.

• So what goes into supporting logistics for clinical trials when confronted by so many pandemic-created obstacles?
• What solutions and services can help companies adhere to trial protocols, keep patients safe and ensure that their therapies are received on time?
• And what are the best logistics practices for overcoming an array of challenges – including government regulations, severely reduced airline schedules and dire economic situations.

Scott Ohanesian, Senior VP of QuickSTAT’s Commercial Operations in North America, works with pharmaceutical and biotech companies on designing comprehensive clinical trial logistics plans. In his years of work, Scott has created customized supply chain solutions – from pre-clinical to clinical to commercialization – that meet client objectives, maintain product integrity and ensure patient safety.

To learn more about Quick’s global logistics solutions, go to quick.aero/podcasts.

Logistics that Saves Lives, with Dave Murphy

Sometimes, the world of time-critical shipping can mean the difference between life or death. Blood. Organs for transplants. Human tissue. Cell or gene immunotherapies. Ensuring their safe delivery – getting them often from one side of the country to the other, where a patient in a hospital waits – brings global supply chain logistics challenges to a whole new level. 

For 30 years, that’s been the focus of Dave Murphy. Dave is Executive Vice President with Quick Specialized Healthcare Logistics and has seen – and managed through – the challenges and changes in global supply chain management. 

In this episode of QuickConversations, host Chris Riback speaks with Dave about his experience in the critical healthcare logistics space and covers a wide range of topics, including:

• How the evolution of personalized medicine has impacted global supply chain logistics.
• The technologies that are most important to know about and rely on.
• What goes into delivering life-critical organs or medical devices when faced with natural disasters or a global health crisis.

To learn more about Quick’s global logistics solutions, go to quick.aero/podcasts.