Case Study

SFDC VEEVA Interface Development and Application and Data Support for
Leading Pharmaceutical Organization

Quick Facts
Industry: Pharmaceutical
Customer Geographies
US, China, Australia, Canada,
Europe, Japan, Emerging Markets
Users
~ 25,000 globally
Technology Stack
VEEVA, Salesforce.com,
Informatica Power Center,
Informatica Cloud, Apex Data
Loader, Oracle, Linux

Background
The organization is amongst the top 10 pharmaceutical companies in the world. The
organization has clinical research conducted in 50+ countries, R&D facilities in 8
countries, manufacturing plants in 13 countries and its products are marketed in over
125 countries.

Client Pain Areas

Multiple systems globally for CRM / SFA with majority systems based on Siebel
platform
The organization was using iCall in China and Siebel Japan
There was no global call center application and the call center application
concentration was on western markets (US and Europe)

Objectives
A decision was made to implement a new Global CRM platform with the following key
objectives:
Modernize existing solution by moving to a Cloud based CRM solution
Reduce number of existing CRM applications and the long term cost of ownership
Implement a simplified solution with improved user experience
Process simplification and standardization
Build a solution agile and scalable solution
The organization made a decision to implement VEEVA CRM and SFDC Call Center to
support its field and office based sales staff and healthcare professionals globally.

Scope
The organization selected HCL as its global system integration partner with the
capability to provide global support (US and OUS) of the developed system which is
broadly classified as below:
Part 1
Veeva and SFDC Call
Center Application &
Data Support

Part 2

Part 3

Integration Support
(Troubleshoot,
Resolve data and
interface issues)

Create/ Enhance new/

existing informatica
interfaces

Scope Of Services - Part 1:

Veeva and SFDC Call Center Application and
Data Support

Scope of Services - Application Support

Investigation and resolution of issues associated with application functionality or
reporting of such issues where Veeva or call center configuration or code changes
are required.
Investigation and resolution of problems associated with loading of data files as and
when requested
Creating and maintaining Known Error Database (KEDB)

Scope of Services - Data Support

Investigation and resolution of issues of missing or inaccurate data
Passing ticket to integration support partner if necessary
Creating and maintaining Known Error Database (KEDB)
Scope Of Services - Part 2:
Integration Support

Scope of Services - Technical Support

Break fix related investigation and resolution of interface related issues
Third party coordination for troubleshooting beyond scope of immediate interface
change

Scope of Services - Operational Support

Resolving technical design and implementation issues with third party partner
related to interfaces
Daily monitoring of interface execution
Report interface failures and perform root cause analysis
Maintain compatibility with integration platforms which may be upgraded or
modified over time

Managing scheduled jobs and workflows

Retiring workflows that are no longer required
Working with third parties as necessary to achieve all of the above
Creating and maintaining Known Error Database (KEDB)

Scope Of Services - Part 3:

Create/ Enhance new/ existing Informatica
interfaces

Scope of Services - Enhancement and Development

Custom code development
Design and enhance/ develop new interfaces
Release Management (develop release plan to move code into production)

Scope of Services - End to End Test Planning and Execution

Validation testing
Functional testing
Integration testing
Regression testing, including end to end testing from source to target.
Performance testing
Stress testing where appropriate
Creating and maintaining test data set where applicable

Support Overview
Global Support
Veeva and SFDC Call Center
Application and Data Support

Integration Support (Troubleshoot,

Resolve Data and Interface Issues)

Enhancement and
Development

Application Support
Technical Support
Data Support

Knowledge transition
from incumbent vendor
or relevant client team(s)

Operational Support
End to End Test
Planning and Execution

Project Management
SLA & Metrics Rep.

Proactive Problem Mgmt.

SOP Based Resolution

TRANSITION

Phased transition approach with proactive risk

management

Dedicated transition management including reviews and

checkpoints

Transition using HCLs proprietary transition framework,

ASSeT, customized based on the objectives and scope
of the engagement

Established KEDB
Continuous Improvement

Knowledge transition
from HCL Development
team

STEADY STATE

Dedicated core support team based in India and Technical

Manager in key onsite locations

24x5 support during weekdays & on call support weekends

Defined Governance Structure, Communication and

Escalation Mechanism and RACI matrix

SLA driven support

Creation and maintenance of KEDB (Known Error Database)

Key Challenges
S. No Challenges
1

SLA compliance

2.

Third Party
Dependency

3.

Late Assignment of
tickets
User Awaiting
tickets

Concern Area
All incidents or Service Request were being created as Trouble
Tickets. TT not being closed until CR/Enhancement gets
deployed in PRD. No SLA clock STOP until solution deployed in
production.
Remedy being very old application, no SLA calculation medium
available to measure the SLAs.
Third Party dependency i.e. Veeva, SFDC, Informatica, etc. and
same SLAs still remains with HCL
Veeva, main CRM application but many upstream and
downstream systems involved. Ticket to remain in OPEN state
until gets fixed even if HCL is not responsible to fix it. Change to
reflect in Veeva app for closure of the tickets.
Many tickets were in waiting state with SLA clock ON for
additional inputs or confirmation.

4.

CR Process

Customer raised issues i.e. CR documentation quality and

presentation skills. Knowledge of GxP changes, domain
knowledge were some other challenges.

5.

Week end tickets

SLAs were applicable for week ends as well and tickets coming
over the week end were cases for SLA breach.

Summary: Client was going through multiple rollouts, each organizational rollout
had a lot of stabilization items and more focus was going towards fixing those
stabilization items.

Action Taken
S. No Challenges

Concern Area

SLA compliance

A focused & dedicated team to work on recent tickets, another

to focus on ticket backlog & aging.
CR and TT handing team structuring
Regular on-call training sessions
A new application developed on Salesforce for SLA dashboard
and daily SLA report shared with team

2.

Third Party
Dependency

Closed follow up with vendors like Veeva, SFDC, Informatica

Child Ticket process for other service providers i.e. TCS, IBM etc

3.

Late Assignment of
tickets

Weekly report on late assignment tickets

Only tickets where addition inputs needed to be in waiting
state with regular follow ups. User confirmation tickets to be
fixed, once support team is sure of solution.

User Awaiting
tickets

S. No Challenges
4.

CR Process

5.

Week end tickets

Concern Area
Regular CR process training sessions were conducted
Weekly audits were conducted by HCL chief compliance office
and learning were shared with the team
GxP training sessions.
SLAs were applicable for week ends as well and tickets coming
over the week end were cases for SLA breach.

Summary: HCL and Client had a one week workshop in January2013 to deep dive
and above areas were identified to be worked on. Team achieved SLA targets along
with other metrics defined together.

Value Addition

Dashboard for SLA monitoring, Shift management and other reporting.

Salesforce License Management for Veeva
Automation of many interfaces to avoid human errors.
Optimization of various interfaces to be finished on time.
Dashboard for Interface monitoring
Interface scalability through parameterization

Key Initiatives & Improvements

Better Process
Adherence

Interface monitoring
And Communication

Service Improvement

Problem management Process for RCA and long term

fixes
Continued effort on Operations call to reduce open
issues
Focus on the CCB and CR process to improve RFT
metric
Automated notifications for daily job runs to selected
COE team members and BIs
Pro-actively communicating with ODS, DS, affiliates
on Job delays
Better co-ordination with upstream and down stream
application teams on Issues resolutions
Implementing long term fix to reduce TT volumes
Continued efforts has led to downward trend for
number of TTs, TT backlog and TT ageing.
Focus on meeting region-wise SLAs and then target
country-wise as next step

Support Coverage
hours

Trainings

Managing 24X7 support

Better planning for monthly job processing
Special team formulation for big issues

Series of trainings conducted for Pharma domain and

GXP
Regular training sessions on Client SOPs and
processes
Continuous need based trainings on interfaces and
SFDC/Veeva Skills

For more information, write to us at:

contact.lsh@hcl.com