Where are the opportunities for medtech and pharma in 2020?

It's that time when we start to look ahead to what next year holds for the life science sector...Lu Rahman outlines 2020s big medtech players A decade ago the healthcare advances create by AI would have seemed the stuff of dreams. But back in 2018 Theresa May announced plans to use artificial intelligence and data to transform the way certain diseases like cancer. The technology is moving at a pace – this year we heard that a team led by the University of Surrey had filed the first ever patent for inventions autonomously created by AI without a human inventor. Professor Ryan Abbott explained the implications this had for the life science sector: "These filings are important to any area of research and development as well as any area that relies on patents. Patents are more important in the life sciences than in many other areas, particularly for drug discovery. AI has also been used extensively in the drug discovery process for a long time for tasks like screening of compounds and in silico analysis. These tasks can be the foundation for patent filings. "As AI is becoming increasingly sophisticated, it is likely to play an increasing role in R&D including in the life sciences.