Veeva Systems 2021–2025: An Evolving Life Sciences Cloud Leader

Introduction

Since the 2021 Everest Group PEAK Matrix report, Veeva Systems has dramatically expanded its role as a strategic IT partner for life sciences. The company's cloud platforms – Veeva Commercial Cloud for customer engagement and Veeva Development Cloud for R&D – have seen major upgrades, new product launches, and wider adoption across pharma. Veeva remains the "go-to" software provider for pharmaceutical enterprises (Salesforce And IQVIA's Partnership – A Match Made In Heaven? - Blog - Everest Group), even as competitors like Salesforce, IQVIA, and Oracle intensify their efforts. This update reviews the most significant developments in Veeva's ecosystem since 2021, including enhancements to key product suites, strategic shifts in company direction, new solutions and partnerships, adoption trends, and Veeva's responses to emerging competitive and regulatory challenges.

Commercial Cloud: CRM Evolution and Content Innovations

Veeva's Commercial Cloud suite – spanning customer relationship management and content management for marketing/medical – has undergone pivotal changes. Veeva CRM, long built on the Salesforce platform, is being reborn as Veeva Vault CRM, a native application on Veeva's own Vault platform. In 2022 Veeva introduced Vault CRM for MedTech, a unified CRM and content management app tailored to medical device companies (Veeva Systems - Veeva Introduces Veeva Vault CRM for Medtech). Vault CRM for MedTech provides industry-specific capabilities (like inventory and surgical case management) in a single application, eliminating the need for heavy custom integrations (Veeva Systems - Veeva Introduces Veeva Vault CRM for Medtech). More broadly, Veeva confirmed it will migrate all CRM customers off Salesforce by 2025, with support until 2030 for those who need it (Veeva Is Building Its Own Cloud Platform, Plus Other New Capabilities for Managing Life Sciences Sales and Marketing). Pilot programs for Vault CRM in pharma started in 2024, and Veeva added new features such as a built-in "Service Center" for call handling and an AI-powered CRM Bot to assist sales reps with generating content (Veeva Is Building Its Own Cloud Platform, Plus Other New Capabilities for Managing Life Sciences Sales and Marketing). By late 2024, Veeva even unveiled Vault CRM Bot and Voice Control, generative AI features that let reps use natural language to retrieve information and draft communications (Veeva Announces AI in Vault CRM - Veeva). These innovations underscore Veeva's commitment to keep its dominant CRM offering ahead of the curve in usability and intelligence.

Alongside CRM, Veeva's content and engagement products have matured. Veeva Vault PromoMats, the industry-standard system for compliant promotional materials management, and Vault MedComms, for medical affairs content, continue to be core to Commercial Cloud. They've gained enhancements for omnichannel digital content and better integration with CRM – for example, Vault CRM connects natively with Vault PromoMats to streamline content sharing with field teams (Veeva Systems - Veeva Introduces Veeva Vault CRM for Medtech). Many pharma companies have leveraged these tools in launching products digitally. (For instance, Bavarian Nordic adopted Veeva CRM and PromoMats to power the digital launch of new vaccines in 2022 (Bavarian Nordic Adopting Veeva CRM and Veeva Vault PromoMats ...).) Veeva has also expanded its data offerings to complement Commercial Cloud: the company's Veeva Link applications (for real-time stakeholder intelligence) and Compass data products have added deeper analytics on healthcare providers and patients (Veeva Is Building Its Own Cloud Platform, Plus Other New Capabilities for Managing Life Sciences Sales and Marketing). These data services, integrated with CRM, help companies personalize engagement and respond to competitors like IQVIA's data-driven platforms. Overall, Veeva's commercial suite as of 2025 is far more unified – bringing CRM, content, and data together on the Vault platform – which improves efficiency and compliance for life sciences customer engagement.

Development Cloud: Clinical, Regulatory, Quality, and Safety Advances

On the R&D side, Veeva Development Cloud has rapidly evolved into an end-to-end platform covering clinical, regulatory, quality, and safety processes. Pharma companies are increasingly standardizing on Veeva's Development Cloud to break down silos. A prime example is Boehringer Ingelheim's new "One Medicine Platform," launched in 2025 on Veeva Development Cloud (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva). This unified R&D platform connects Boehringer's clinical, regulatory, and quality data and processes, enabling seamless collaboration and faster product development (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva) (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva). The trend reflects a broader industry move to unify R&D IT systems for efficiency and compliance, a vision Veeva has been driving since 2021. Notably, Veeva's R&D revenues now make up over half of the company's business, as more organizations "take action to unify clinical systems and processes to ease data sharing, increase efficiency… and speed in clinical trials" (Everest Group PEAK Matrix® for Veeva Service Providers 2021).

Clinical Suite: Veeva has significantly expanded its clinical trial solutions. Its flagship electronic trial master file and study management products (Vault eTMF, CTMS, Study Startup) have been joined by a modern clinical data management suite. Veeva Vault EDC, first launched in 2020, gained major ground – by late 2022, six of the global top 20 pharma companies committed to using Vault EDC for all new trials (Veeva Systems - Veeva Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2023 Results). Vault EDC is part of a larger data suite including Veeva CDB (data cleaning) and Veeva RTSM (randomization and trial supply). To bolster randomization capabilities, Veeva acquired Veracity Logic in early 2022, a specialist in interactive response technology for trial randomization and drug supply management (Cloud Stocks: Analysis of Veeva's Veracity Acquisition - Sramana Mitra). This acquisition extended Veeva's native Vault RTSM offering, which by then had supported over 175 trials across pharma, biotech, and medtech (Cloud Stocks: Analysis of Veeva's Veracity Acquisition - Sramana Mitra). Another focus has been digital patient engagement in clinical trials. Veeva introduced MyVeeva for Patients, a participant portal, along with applications like Veeva eConsent and Veeva ePRO (electronic patient-reported outcomes). In 2023, UCB partnered with Veeva to implement ePRO and eConsent, aiming to set a new standard for patient-centric digital trials (UCB and Veeva collaborate to advance the patient experience in clinical trials - UCB) (UCB and Veeva collaborate to advance the patient experience in clinical trials - UCB). These apps, accessed through MyVeeva, let patients complete consents and surveys online, feeding data back to sponsors and sites in real time. By integrating patients directly into the Vault Clinical Suite, Veeva is helping sponsors conduct hybrid and decentralized trials – a capability that grew in importance with industry adoption of remote trials and new regulatory guidance since the pandemic.

Regulatory (RIM): Veeva's Vault RIM (Regulatory Information Management) suite has become a de facto industry standard for managing drug registration data and health authority submissions. Since 2021, Vault RIM has been enhanced to keep pace with evolving regulations worldwide. For example, Veeva built in support for the EU's new IDMP (Identification of Medicinal Products) data standards, allowing companies to compile and submit IDMP product data directly from Vault ([PDF] End-to-end RIM on a unified platform - Veeva Systems). Vault RIM's flexible data model and registration tracking help organizations meet requirements like EMA's IDMP and XEVMPD without separate tools ([PDF] End-to-end RIM on a unified platform - Veeva Systems). Pharma firms are using Vault RIM to globalize and automate their regulatory processes – managing dossiers, correspondence, and commitments on one platform. The momentum is evident in case studies like a top biotech (Sobi) scaling its regulatory operations via Vault RIM to support rapid global expansion (Sobi Scales Regulatory Operations for Rapid Global Growth). By centralizing all regulatory content and data, Veeva enables faster, more transparent interactions with regulators, which is crucial as authorities push for more electronic submissions and data-driven oversight.

Quality and Manufacturing: Veeva has made some of its biggest strides in the quality domain. Vault Quality Suite (which includes Vault QMS for quality processes and Vault QualityDocs for GxP document control) is now used by over 500 life sciences companies to modernize quality management (Veeva Partners with Sanofi to Transform its Quality System - Veeva) (Veeva Partners with Sanofi to Transform its Quality System - Veeva). A marquee project is Sanofi's quality transformation: in 2023 Sanofi began implementing Vault QMS and QualityDocs across the enterprise (including vaccines and consumer health), replacing legacy systems to create a unified, cloud-based quality model (Veeva Partners with Sanofi to Transform its Quality System - Veeva) (Veeva Partners with Sanofi to Transform its Quality System - Veeva). Sanofi went live first in its Consumer Healthcare unit, using Vault QualityDocs and even Vault Training to manage GxP training content, with the rest of the company to follow (Veeva Partners with Sanofi to Transform its Quality System - Veeva). By consolidating on Veeva's Quality Suite, Sanofi aims to standardize processes and enable a "more dynamic quality operating model" while ensuring compliance (Veeva Partners with Sanofi to Transform its Quality System - Veeva).

Beyond core QMS, Veeva has broadened into laboratory and manufacturing solutions – a strategic extension of its quality offerings. It announced Veeva Vault LIMS (Laboratory Information Management System) in late 2021 and delivered it by 2022 as a modern cloud LIMS for QC labs (What Will Veeva Vault LIMS Mean for the Life Sciences Industry?). By 2024, Vault LIMS had several early adopters and "increasing momentum" as companies saw the benefit of linking Quality Assurance and Quality Control data in one system (Veeva Systems - Veeva Vault LIMS Gains Momentum as Companies Unify Quality Assurance and Quality Control). Vault LIMS is unified with Vault Quality, allowing test results and lab data to flow directly into QMS workflows for faster batch disposition (Veeva Systems - Veeva Vault LIMS Gains Momentum as Companies Unify Quality Assurance and Quality Control) (Veeva Systems - Veeva Vault LIMS Gains Momentum as Companies Unify Quality Assurance and Quality Control). For example, Forge Biologics replaced paper-based QC documentation with Vault LIMS, expecting to reduce errors and refocus staff on science rather than paperwork. Veeva also introduced Vault Validation Management (a paperless validation solution for IT systems and equipment qualification) (Unified Paperless Validation Solution for Life Sciences - Veeva), and in 2023 it unveiled Vault Batch Release, a specialized application to streamline product release in manufacturing. Vault Batch Release automates the aggregation and review of batch data across QMS, LIMS, ERP, and regulatory systems, providing real-time visibility into release status (Veeva Launches New Batch Release Application to Speed Time-to-Market - Contract Pharma). The app, available in 2024, connects with Vault QMS, Vault LIMS, and Vault RIM to enable faster, compliant GMP release decisions (Veeva Launches New Batch Release Application to Speed Time-to-Market - Contract Pharma). As Veeva's VP of Quality Mike Jovanis noted, this end-to-end solution tackles an "underserved, complex process" and can significantly reduce release cycle times and compliance risk (Veeva Launches New Batch Release Application to Speed Time-to-Market - Contract Pharma). With these moves into labs and production, Veeva extended its life sciences cloud further down the value chain – a noteworthy strategic expansion beyond its original R&D focus.

Safety and Pharmacovigilance: Veeva has also built out a Vault Safety suite, targeting a domain long dominated by Oracle's Argus safety system. Vault Safety includes an adverse event case management application for intake, processing, and reporting of ICSRs (individual case safety reports) (Veeva Safety - Modern Adverse Event & Case Management System), as well as Vault SafetyDocs for managing drug safety documents. Around 2021, Veeva partnered with early adopters to refine Vault Safety, and by 2022 it began offering a unified safety solution fully integrated with clinical and quality. For instance, the LYSARC research network in Europe adopted Vault Clinical, Quality, and Safety together, aiming to use the unified platform to improve trial oversight and ensure compliance across all operations (Cloud Stocks: Analysis of Veeva's Veracity Acquisition - Sramana Mitra). By having safety data and documents on the same cloud as clinical trial data, companies can more readily detect and act on safety signals. While Vault Safety's market traction among big pharma is still emerging (many remain on legacy systems), Veeva's end-to-end Development Cloud pitch – "connecting clinical, quality, regulatory, and safety applications to simplify end-to-end processes" (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva) – is resonating. The comprehensive approach helps life sciences firms comply with stringent GxP and pharmacovigilance requirements by design, since all regulated content and data reside on a single validated platform.

Strategic Shifts and New Initiatives

Veeva's recent moves reflect strategic ambitions that go beyond incremental product updates. One major shift has been vertical expansion beyond pharma. Historically focused on biopharma, Veeva has in the past few years launched tailored solutions for medtech, animal health, and even consumer goods industries. The introduction of Vault CRM for MedTech (with medtech-specific functionality) is one example of Veeva's verticalization strategy (Veeva Systems - Veeva Introduces Veeva Vault CRM for Medtech). In 2023, Veeva also created dedicated industry clouds for Consumer Products, Cosmetics, and Chemicals, leveraging its QualityOne and RegulatoryOne offerings to manage things like product claims, safety, and quality in those sectors (Veeva Systems Extends Life Science Industry Cloud into Manufacturing. In… - Daniel Matlis) (Veeva Systems Extends Life Science Industry Cloud into Manufacturing. In… - Daniel Matlis). This expansion outside of pharma provides Veeva new growth avenues, though life sciences remains the core focus. Notably, Veeva converted to a Public Benefit Corporation (PBC) in 2021, signaling that it prioritizes long-term stakeholder value (including industry customers and patients) over short-term gains (Veeva and Merck Form Long-Term Strategic Partnership - Veeva). This move was well-received by pharma partners as a commitment to stability and industry collaboration.

Another strategic pivot is platform consolidation – unifying all offerings on the Veeva Vault platform. By moving CRM off Salesforce to Vault, Veeva will have its entire product portfolio on a single technology stack it controls. This consolidation simplifies integration across commercial and R&D. We see the payoff in projects like Boehringer's One Medicine Platform, which connects R&D and commercial data for a holistic view of the product lifecycle (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva) (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva). It also ensures Veeva can innovate at its own pace without dependency on third-party platforms. The decision to separate from Salesforce was announced in 2022 amid "mounting risks and roadblocks" in that partnership (Salesforce's AI-Powered Life Sciences Cloud Transforms How ...). Veeva's CEO Peter Gassner positioned it as necessary to build a "durable, growth business for the long term" (Veeva Systems - Veeva Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2023 Results). Since then, Veeva has doubled down on Vault platform capabilities – for example, introducing a high-speed Vault Direct Data API that provides data access 100x faster than traditional APIs, to support real-time analytics and AI on Vault data (Veeva Systems - Veeva Launches AI Partner Program). Unifying its platform also helps Veeva and its clients maintain rigorous GxP compliance. All Vault applications are developed with built-in validation and audit trails by experts seasoned in regulatory requirements ([PDF] Veeva Vault Validation). Veeva even launched a Vault Validation Management app to help customers manage their system validation documentation in an agile, paperless way (Unified Paperless Validation Solution for Life Sciences - Veeva). These steps underscore how Veeva's single-platform strategy is aimed at both innovation and compliance confidence.

Strategically, Veeva is also aligning with industry priorities such as patient-centricity and data-driven R&D. Its collaboration with UCB to improve patient experiences in trials (through eConsent/ePRO) shows Veeva positioning itself at the forefront of decentralized trial enablement (UCB and Veeva collaborate to advance the patient experience in clinical trials - UCB) (UCB and Veeva collaborate to advance the patient experience in clinical trials - UCB). In the regulatory arena, Veeva actively engages with agencies and standards organizations – providing resources to help customers meet new mandates like EMA's IDMP, as noted, and embracing initiatives for structured content and faster submissions. The company's status as the first (and so far only) true cloud PBC in life sciences tech gives it a unique branding in working "for the betterment" of the industry ecosystem.

Ecosystem Growth: Partnerships, M&A, and Adoption

From 2021 to 2025, Veeva has cultivated deep partnerships and seen robust adoption across its customer base. A landmark development was Veeva's 10-year strategic partnership with Merck, announced in late 2022 (Veeva and Merck Form Long-Term Strategic Partnership - Veeva). Under this deal, Merck (MSD) agreed to take a "Veeva-first" approach for new software and data investments, choosing Veeva products as long as they fit requirements (Veeva and Merck Form Long-Term Strategic Partnership - Veeva). In return, Merck gets strategic pricing and influence on Veeva's product roadmap (Veeva and Merck Form Long-Term Strategic Partnership - Veeva). This was a powerful endorsement from a top-5 pharma, extending an existing 12-year relationship. It signaled to the market that large pharma are willing to standardize on Veeva as an integrated platform partner rather than treat it as a point solution vendor. Merck's CEO highlighted how the expanded partnership would enable Merck's digital strategy and help deliver value to patients faster (Veeva and Merck Form Long-Term Strategic Partnership - Veeva). Following Merck, other big players increased their bets on Veeva. In 2024, Boehringer Ingelheim, another top-20 pharma, became the latest to commit to Veeva's next-gen CRM, planning to move from Veeva's legacy CRM to Vault CRM globally (Boehringer Ingelheim Adopts Veeva Vault CRM - Contract Pharma). Boehringer had already been a long-time Veeva Commercial Cloud customer; with this move, its executives aim to "shape the future of life sciences" in partnership with Veeva and accelerate product launches through improved digital engagement (Boehringer Ingelheim Adopts Veeva Vault CRM - Contract Pharma) (Boehringer Ingelheim Adopts Veeva Vault CRM - Contract Pharma). Such multi-year, enterprise-level commitments underscore a trend: pharmaceutical companies are not just buying individual Veeva modules, but are increasingly adopting Veeva's platform as their digital backbone for both commercial and R&D operations.

Veeva's ecosystem has also grown via selective acquisitions and alliances. The 2022 acquisition of Veracity Logic (RTSM) was one example, filling a key gap in the clinical suite (Cloud Stocks: Analysis of Veeva's Veracity Acquisition - Sramana Mitra). Earlier, Veeva's 2019 acquisition of Crossix and 2020 acquisition of Physician World strengthened its data and events capabilities, which now manifest in the Veeva Data Cloud and Veeva Digital Events offerings. In addition, Veeva has forged alliances with specialty research organizations. A notable partnership in 2022 was with LYSARC (the Lymphoma Academic Research Organization), where Veeva provided Vault Clinical, Quality, and Safety applications to create a unified tech foundation for their trials (Cloud Stocks: Analysis of Veeva's Veracity Acquisition - Sramana Mitra). This partnership aimed to demonstrate how an integrated platform can improve trial efficiency, data quality, and oversight in a complex, multi-stakeholder environment (Cloud Stocks: Analysis of Veeva's Veracity Acquisition - Sramana Mitra). It also served as a reference for other academic research networks and smaller biotechs, a fast-growing customer segment for Veeva. On the quality front, Veeva partnered with Sanofi in 2023 to overhaul its global quality systems, as mentioned. And in manufacturing, Veeva is working closely with early adopters like CSL Behring and Dermatological Lab of Texas (not publicly cited, but referenced at conferences) to extend Vault Quality into production areas.

These collaborations have translated into strong adoption metrics. As of 2023, Veeva served over 1,000 customers, including the world's largest pharmaceutical companies and hundreds of emerging biotechs (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva). Its total revenue has grown from about $1.5 billion in 2021 to over $2.15 billion in fiscal 2023 (16% year-over-year growth) (Veeva Systems - Veeva Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2023 Results), and the company projected ~$2.35 billion in FY2024 revenue (Veeva Systems - Veeva Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2023 Results). This sustained growth is fueled by broad uptake of both Commercial and R&D products (Veeva Systems - Veeva Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2023 Results). In fact, Veeva now offers over 30 distinct software and data products for life sciences (Veeva Systems - Veeva Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2023 Results), and many clients use multiple suites. For example, Bristol Myers Squibb has more than 70% of its employees on the Veeva Vault Platform across clinical, regulatory, safety, and even commercial use cases (Scaling Technical Operations Across Veeva Development Cloud - Veeva) (Scaling Technical Operations Across Veeva Development Cloud - Veeva). Likewise, AstraZeneca, Novartis, and Pfizer each use a range of Veeva applications from RIM to CRM (though not all have gone public with details). The ecosystem of service partners has expanded too – consulting firms like Accenture, Deloitte, and others have built dedicated Veeva practices to support these large-scale implementations (Everest Group PEAK Matrix® for Veeva Service Providers 2021) (Everest Group PEAK Matrix® for Veeva Service Providers 2021). Everest Group estimated the Veeva-specific services market would reach $2B by 2025, as SIs race to build expertise in Veeva consulting, implementation, and support (Everest Group PEAK Matrix® for Veeva Service Providers 2021) (Everest Group PEAK Matrix® for Veeva Service Providers 2021). This has created a virtuous cycle: as more pharma companies adopt Veeva broadly, a larger talent pool and partner network evolves, which in turn makes it easier for new customers to successfully onboard Veeva solutions.

Competitive Landscape and Industry Trends

Veeva's success has not gone unnoticed by competitors, spurring responses that executives must weigh. Perhaps the biggest competitive shift is the looming direct competition from Salesforce. With Veeva's CRM contract ending in 2025, Salesforce has teamed up with IQVIA to develop its own Life Sciences Cloud for customer engagement (Salesforce's AI-Powered Life Sciences Cloud Transforms How Pharma and MedTech Companies Engage with Patients and Healthcare Professionals - Salesforce). Salesforce's new offering (enhanced with IQVIA's Orchestrated Customer Engagement software and data) is slated for launch in late 2025, after the contractual non-compete period (Salesforce's AI-Powered Life Sciences Cloud Transforms How Pharma and MedTech Companies Engage with Patients and Healthcare Professionals - Salesforce) (Salesforce And IQVIA's Partnership – A Match Made In Heaven? - Blog - Everest Group). Salesforce even hired a former Veeva senior executive to lead its life sciences division (Salesforce And IQVIA's Partnership – A Match Made In Heaven? - Blog - Everest Group), underscoring that "the battle for market leadership is going to be fierce" (Salesforce And IQVIA's Partnership – A Match Made In Heaven? - Blog - Everest Group) (Salesforce And IQVIA's Partnership – A Match Made In Heaven? - Blog - Everest Group). However, industry analysts note that Veeva enjoys a strong incumbent position – it is deeply specialized in life sciences, whereas Salesforce enters as a generalist platform "carrying the baggage of being a jack-of-all-trades" in CRM (Salesforce And IQVIA's Partnership – A Match Made In Heaven? - Blog - Everest Group). Moreover, IQVIA (which will continue to support its OCE customers through 2029 (Salesforce And IQVIA's Partnership – A Match Made In Heaven? - Blog - Everest Group)) is both a partner and competitor, and some pharma companies may be cautious about relying on a vendor that also sells them data. For now, Veeva's strategy to preempt this threat is clearly to innovate faster and lock in customer loyalty. The rapid rollout of Vault CRM and the high-profile CRM commitments from the likes of Boehringer (Boehringer Ingelheim Adopts Veeva Vault CRM - Contract Pharma) suggest that many companies are choosing to stay within Veeva's ecosystem for the next generation of CRM rather than switch horses.

On the R&D side, Veeva faces competitors like Oracle (which offers clinical trial software and the Argus safety suite) and Dassault Systèmes (owner of Medidata, a leader in EDC and eClinical tools). Oracle, after acquiring Phase Forward and Siebel CTMS years ago, has struggled to provide a unified cloud experience, and it still largely offers point solutions (e.g. different platforms for EDC, safety, clinical trial management). Medidata remains strong in EDC (especially for complex trials), but Veeva's win of 6 top-20 pharmas for Vault EDC (Veeva Systems - Veeva Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2023 Results) indicates a notable shift in the clinical data market. Veeva's pitch of an integrated Operations + Data platform (EDC plus eTMF, CTMS, etc. all in one cloud) is resonating against older architectures. In pharmacovigilance, Oracle's Argus is entrenched at many large companies; Veeva Vault Safety is the cloud challenger. While still early, some firms are beginning to consider moving safety off legacy systems to something that unifies with their quality and clinical domains – a niche Veeva is uniquely positioned for, if it can prove Vault Safety at scale.

IQVIA, beyond the Salesforce alliance, competes with Veeva through its data and analytics offerings. IQVIA's OCE has been the primary alternative to Veeva CRM for pharma sales teams, and IQVIA leads the life sciences software market with ~17% share (including its data services) (Top 10 Life Sciences Software Vendors, Market Size and Market Forecast 2023-2028). Veeva, at roughly the third-largest market share (Top 10 Life Sciences Software Vendors, Market Size and Market Forecast 2023-2028), has countered by launching its own data cloud and real-time intelligence (Link/Compass) to chip away at IQVIA's information advantage. For instance, Veeva now provides physician and patient data products that can feed directly into Veeva CRM, positioning itself as a one-stop-shop for both systems and data. This integrated approach may appeal to companies looking to simplify vendor relationships and reduce the costly data licensing that has traditionally benefited IQVIA. Additionally, Veeva's recent AI initiatives can be seen as a response to competitive pressures and industry trends. Salesforce is infusing AI (Einstein) into its new Life Sciences Cloud (Salesforce's AI-Powered Life Sciences Cloud Transforms How ...), and other competitors tout AI for trial design and drug discovery. Veeva in turn has begun embedding AI across its products – beyond the CRM Bot, Veeva is exploring AI use cases from content tagging to trial document analysis. In 2024, it launched the Veeva AI Partner Program to allow third-party and customer-developed GenAI solutions to plug into Vault applications easily (Veeva Systems - Veeva Launches AI Partner Program) (Veeva Systems - Veeva Launches AI Partner Program). This includes providing a Vault sandbox and the ultra-fast data API to support training AI models on Vault data (Veeva Systems - Veeva Launches AI Partner Program). By opening its platform for AI development, Veeva is ensuring that pharma companies can leverage emerging AI tools (from NLP to GPT-style analysis) on top of their Veeva environment rather than outside it.

Importantly, Veeva's unified data model could become a differentiator in the age of AI and advanced analytics. As one Veeva executive noted at the 2023 R&D Summit, harmonized data across clinical, regulatory, and quality vaults "enhances the accuracy of generative AI tools such as ChatGPT" when applied to company data (Scaling Technical Operations Across Veeva Development Cloud - Veeva). In other words, having all R&D information in one structured platform may yield better AI-driven insights than if data is scattered across disparate systems. This is a compelling argument as pharma begins to experiment with AI for tasks like pharmacovigilance signal detection, trial site selection, or promotional content generation – all areas which intersect with Veeva-managed processes. Meanwhile, regulators are also adapting to new technology (e.g. FDA's guidance on AI in clinical investigations, EMA's push for more data transparency). Veeva's strategy of close alignment with regulatory trends (IDMP, electronic submissions, etc.) and strong compliance support (audit trails, validation) gives it credibility as a low-risk choice in a landscape where technology is moving fast but regulations remain stringent. Executives appreciate that Veeva's cloud is built "for life sciences… by experts experienced with GxP requirements" ([PDF] Veeva Vault Validation), which helps ensure innovations like AI or cloud integrations are implemented in a compliant manner.

Conclusion and Outlook

In the span of four years, Veeva Systems has reinforced its position as an indispensable technology partner for pharma, even as it transforms itself. The company has expanded from a dominant CRM provider into a broad-based industry cloud platform that now touches virtually every corner of drug development and commercialization. Major pharma organizations are leveraging Veeva not in isolation, but as an integrated backbone to harmonize their critical data and processes – from R&D project management to medical content, from regulatory submissions to field sales interactions. This holistic value proposition is what sets Veeva apart from point solution vendors. Since 2021, Veeva's Commercial Cloud saw the groundbreaking shift to Vault CRM and deeper data/AI integration, while the Development Cloud matured with new clinical data capabilities, unified quality-management spanning labs to plants, and advances in regulatory and safety suites. Veeva's strategic choices – such as becoming a PBC, investing heavily in platform unification, and proactively embracing new tech like generative AI – all signal a company gearing up to serve as a long-term "digital steward" for the life sciences industry.

Going forward, pharmaceutical executives can expect continued innovation from Veeva, often in close collaboration with industry leaders. The long-term partnerships (e.g. Merck's 10-year deal (Veeva and Merck Form Long-Term Strategic Partnership - Veeva)) indicate that Veeva will be co-innovating with its customers on future needs like real-world data integration, fully paperless trials, AI-assisted regulatory filings, and more. At the same time, competition will increase: Salesforce, IQVIA, Oracle, and others are converging on the life sciences cloud opportunity, each bringing their strengths. This competition may spur faster development of new features and possibly more pricing pressure. Yet, as of 2025, Veeva holds a strong hand: it offers a proven, mission-critical platform with extensive domain functionality, a large installed base, and high customer trust. Analysts note that Veeva has "established itself" at the top of the life sciences CRM/R&D market, while rivals still need to prove they can match its industry-specific depth (Salesforce And IQVIA's Partnership – A Match Made In Heaven? - Blog - Everest Group).

For pharma IT decision-makers, the recent developments in the Veeva ecosystem highlight several takeaways. First, the breadth of Veeva's suite means companies can pursue a unified platform strategy (commercial + R&D together) to simplify their landscape – an approach that Boehringer and others have found beneficial for speed and data continuity (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva) (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva). Second, Veeva's focus on community and best practices (through programs like early adopters and Veeva Connect) suggests that adopting Veeva is not just buying software, but joining an ecosystem where peers and regulators are collaboratively shaping solutions. Third, as regulatory and technology currents shift – whether it's new compliance mandates or the rise of AI – Veeva has shown an ability to respond quickly with relevant capabilities, reducing uncertainty for its clients. Of course, due diligence is warranted: companies should monitor how Veeva's new CRM performs at scale, how its relationships with partners (and ex-partners) evolve, and ensure they negotiate contracts that secure them flexibility (e.g., access to their data and interoperable integrations, in line with Veeva's open API stance).

In summary, Veeva Systems enters 2025 as a strategic partner to the life sciences industry, not simply a software vendor. Its Commercial Cloud and Development Cloud have seen transformative updates that strengthen Veeva's value proposition of a unified, compliant, and innovative platform. By executing on strategic shifts – expansion into new industries, consolidation onto Vault, and heavy investment in customer success – Veeva has positioned itself to continue leading, even as the competitive field intensifies. For pharmaceutical executives making IT decisions, Veeva's recent developments affirm that it remains a highly relevant and forward-looking option, offering a path to digital excellence from drug discovery through commercialization. As one pharma leader put it during Veeva's summit, the close partnership with Veeva "promises to help transform [our] operations" and accelerate results (Boehringer Ingelheim Adopts Veeva Vault CRM - Contract Pharma) (Boehringer Ingelheim Adopts Veeva Vault CRM - Contract Pharma). That sentiment is increasingly echoed across the industry – and will likely underpin Veeva's trajectory in the years ahead.

Sources: Major news releases and official statements from Veeva Systems (2022–2025) (Veeva and Merck Form Long-Term Strategic Partnership - Veeva) (Veeva Announces AI in Vault CRM - Veeva); industry media coverage in Pharmaceutical Commerce (Veeva Is Building Its Own Cloud Platform, Plus Other New Capabilities for Managing Life Sciences Sales and Marketing) (Veeva Is Building Its Own Cloud Platform, Plus Other New Capabilities for Managing Life Sciences Sales and Marketing) and Contract Pharma (Veeva Launches New Batch Release Application to Speed Time-to-Market - Contract Pharma) (Veeva Launches New Batch Release Application to Speed Time-to-Market - Contract Pharma); Everest Group and analyst insights (Everest Group PEAK Matrix® for Veeva Service Providers 2021) (Salesforce And IQVIA's Partnership – A Match Made In Heaven? - Blog - Everest Group); and press releases from Veeva's customers and partners including Merck (Veeva and Merck Form Long-Term Strategic Partnership - Veeva), Boehringer Ingelheim (Boehringer Ingelheim Adopts Veeva Vault CRM - Contract Pharma) (Boehringer Ingelheim Partners with Veeva to Launch ‘One Medicine Platform' - Veeva), Sanofi (Veeva Partners with Sanofi to Transform its Quality System - Veeva), and UCB (UCB and Veeva collaborate to advance the patient experience in clinical trials - UCB). These sources reflect the latest available information on Veeva's product updates, strategic direction, ecosystem developments, and the surrounding market context as of 2025.