Syneos Health Partnered With Causaly, Databricks and Microsoft to Put AI Inside Clinical Trials

On August 18, Syneos Health announced the advancement of its AI-powered clinical ecosystem to embed AI at the specific decision points in clinical development where speed and accuracy have the most direct impact on trial performance. These points include protocol design, feasibility planning, enrollment, site activation, monitoring, and operational oversight.

According to the press release, the announcement disclosed three simultaneous partnerships, each addressing a different layer of the clinical development workflow. 

The Causaly partnership targets the scientific intelligence layer where the evidence synthesis and research workflow determines how quickly clinical teams can develop protocol strategy, conduct feasibility analysis, and produce competitive trial intelligence. 

The Databricks integration targets the operational data layer, compressing the time between data capture and actionable insight. The Microsoft partnership targets the productivity layer, agents that reduce friction in day-to-day clinical workflows.

"Our priority is AI that works inside the complexity of clinical trials," said Mike Montello, Chief Digital and Information Officer at Syneos Health. "When technology is applied precisely at critical decision points, teams can anticipate risk earlier to accelerate development."

According to the announcement, Syneos Health teams have reduced the time to derive insights for study strategy and design by approximately 50% using Causaly's agentic AI platform, which accesses a proprietary knowledge graph combining biomedical research and commercial insights specifically built for life sciences

The partnership will roll out across therapeutic area expertise, medical advisory, real-world evidence, patient advocacy, and proposal development, according to the press release.

"Leading with scientific intensity is one of our greatest differentiators," said Matt Harrington, SVP Technology Solutions at Syneos Health. "With Causaly, we're unlocking real efficiency gains and deeper, evidence-grounded insights across our workflows so our experts can spend more time applying strategic, scientific judgment to speed clinical development."

The Databricks integration will provide Syneos Health with a near real-time operational view of clinical trial data. The company said the integration is designed to shorten the time between data capture and analysis, allowing teams to identify issues earlier and respond during trial execution. 

The Microsoft component, building on a partnership established in 2023, has produced more than 280 agents integrated with Microsoft 365 Copilot across Syneos Health's workflows. 

The company said that all capabilities are deployed with human oversight and governance frameworks designed for regulated clinical environments.