Voisin Consulting Life Sciences (VCLS) has appointed Carole Jones as director of market access. Jones will focus on expanding the company’s market access capabilities, enhancing the variety of services that VCLS already offers.

The company’s vision is to support clients to find creative solutions to funding issues and risk sharing strategies, and to manage uncertainty through robust evidence generation. Jones’ responsibilities will span payer strategy, health economics and outcomes research (HEOR), health technology assessment (HTA), and value communications support. Jones’ extensive experience working directly with the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence and National Institute for Health Research on HTAs and policy development, as well as her close relationships with various clinical commissioning groups in the United Kingdom, Gemeinsamer Bundesausschuss (G-BA) and Haute Autorité de Santé (HAS) in Europe and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid in the United States, makes her ideally suited to this position.
 
"We at VCLS, are excited about the appointment of Carole Jones and the opportunities it will bring. It further demonstrates our commitment to becoming leaders in product development and commercialization consultation, by offering a well-rounded service to our clients. The extensive experience Carole brings will strengthen our capabilities and put us at the forefront of integrated pharmaceutical development strategy," commented Emmanuelle Voisin, founder and CEO of VCLS.
 
Jones brings with her a wealth of knowledge and experience from various roles within the healthcare sector. Her career started in the clinical environment and she subsequently gained industry experience working in the commercialization team at QLT (now Novelion Therapeutics), the Canadian biotech company that brought a cutting edge, first-in-class age-related macular degeneration product to market in partnership with Novartis. Jones then transitioned to a global consulting role in IMS Health (now QuintilesIMS) where she was promoted to practice leader of the Portfolio Strategy practice and managed the Europe, Middle East and Africa region for six years.
 
Since leaving IMS, Jones has led the Market Access Solutions practice at Envision Pharma Group, a medical affairs company, where she was involved in publication strategy, development of manuscripts and white papers for peer-reviewed journals, systematic literature reviews, global value dossiers and interactive field-based assets.
 
"I am delighted to be part of an organization with such an active focus on the integration of payer evidence requirements into the clinical development programs of our clients. The combination of world class regulatory and health economics expertise allows us to be powerful advocates for our clients in navigating the complex, evolving pharmaceutical environment. The goal of delivering innovative therapies and making them accessible to patients is at the forefront of the company’s, and my own, vision," said Jones.
 
Market access has become all the more critical as payer constraints grow. The development of an evidence-based strategy with an expanded value proposition that meets the needs of multiple stakeholders, including patients, is essential to the success of new entrants, never more so than in the area of advanced therapy medicinal products.
 
Voisin Consulting Life Sciences is a global product development consultancy, which guides biotechnology, pharmaceutical and medtech manufacturers throughout product development and commercialization. From discovery to patients, VCLS assists innovators to design product development strategies that optimize clinical development in order to drive commercial success, through an understanding of both regulators and providers of healthcare.
 
VCLS’s team of health product specialists seamlessly supplement innovative life sciences companies’ resources with strategic advice and cross-functional operational capabilities. The firm offers integrated solutions to development planning, manufacturing, quality and controls, nonclinical and clinical testing, safety monitoring, and interactions with regulators and health technology assessment agencies. With offices in Cambridge, Somerville and San Francisco (MA, CA & NJ, USA), London (UK), Paris and Rennes (France), Lausanne (Switzerland) and Bangalore (India), VCLS serves a broad range of developers and investors.