IMS Buys Clinical Trial Analytics Firm TTC

US-based research giant IMS Health has acquired benchmarking solutions and analytics company TTC, which helps life science firms plan for and negotiate the costs of clinical trials. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

TCC, which has offices in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and London, England, was established in 1990 by Harold Glass (pictured), who previously sold another company called DataEdge to IMS Health in 2001.

TCC provides clients with a set of clinical trial cost benchmarks, budgeting and negotiating tools. It also maintains the GrantPlan clinical grant benchmarking database, which IMS says provides information to seventeen of the top twenty pharmaceutical companies and eight of the ten largest contract research organizations.

Following the acquisition, IMS will integrate its own evidence-based patient and treatment outcomes insights with TTC's cost data, and the results will be made available through IMS's Clinical Trial Optimization unit.

IMS says the TTC offerings complement its solutions in the areas of protocol feasibility, country allocation, site selection, and enrolment planning and forecasting.

Commenting on the sale, Glass said: 'Our clients are actively seeking more data and analytics to guide their decision making and drive improvements in a process that today is highly inefficient. This combination makes IMS a leading partner for healthcare organizations in the planning and execution of clinical trials built on an evidence-based foundation.'

Web sites: www.imshealth.com and www.ttc-llc.com .