Singapore – Customer experience (CX) has rapidly evolved over the last decade, with generative and autonomous AI technologies reshaping every touchpoint of the customer journey. The diverse APAC region leads the innovation of emerging intelligent technologies across a wide range of industries.
With over 15 years of MNC experience across CX, commercial excellence, digital transformation, and omnichannel strategy in the APAC region, Dr Angel Lo, a CX and Digital Transformation expert, spoke with UpTech Media, sharing how AI is redefining CX in the Medtech, Biotech, and Pharma industries.
“HealthTech organisations across APAC are evolving their CX strategies from multi-channel to true omnichannel orchestration where digital touchpoints and AI work together to elevate hyper-personalisation,” Angel told UpTech Media.
“Forward-thinking companies are embedding two key elements as catalysts for this shift.”
Unifying fragmented data and enhancing compliance
Similar to many industries, the healthcare sector manages and maintains a vast amount of data, including information on every patient who comes through a hospital’s doors. Oftentimes, the data is fragmented across systems, making it more challenging to provide adequate customer journeys.
However, more companies are also embracing AI technologies to streamline data management and provide more personalised CX.
Dr Angel Lo explained how the adoption of real-time orchestration with the capabilities to consolidate customer journey, behavioural, and clinical-support data from siloed systems into a unified framework is helping companies provide more optimised CX.
“Along with a unified repository, AI can then augment predictive needs and deliver more personalised services,” Angel added.
Having strong medical-grade governance with a focus on QARA processes, such as traceability and audit-ready documentation, is also another way companies in the Medtech, Biotech, and Pharma industries ensure the optimised delivery of every touch point for customer journeys.
Supporting this with AI governance frameworks, algorithm validation, and cybersecurity safeguards allows next-gen technologies across the industry to be compliant and assure patient safety.
Navigating the bureaucracy of governance for human-centred CX
Technologies and platforms used in the medical industry are subjected to more stringent regulation under QARA, due to clinical sensitivity and specific patient interactions. While this ensures the safety of patients, it also poses a significant challenge to delivering human-centric CX across the industry.
“APAC’s regulatory landscape is highly fragmented with PDPA in Singapore, DPDP in India, APPI in Japan, PIPA in South Korea and PDPO in Hong Kong, among many others, making it more difficult to create consistent experiences while managing data requirements, patient-consent flows, and cybersecurity obligations,” Angel explained.
She added, “Many organisations still operate in fragmented technology landscapes where interactions across CRMs, ERPs and offline clinical engagements remain siloed.”
All of this results in slower cycles for content approval, legal review, and system validation, which hinder the nurturing of human-centric services and customer journeys.
“While AI can help, organisations must be mindful to balance efficiency with empathy, especially when supporting surgeons, nurses, patients and lab scientists who expect guidance, not generic chatbot scripts,” Angel commented.
The balance of implementing intelligent systems to streamline data management processes, while supporting human teams, is a constant factor across many industries, including Medtech and healthtech. Digital empathy needs to remain at the core of every interaction to provide impactful CX.
Harmonising the partnership between AI and human expertise
Dr Angel Lo shared how CX across the Medtech, Biotech, and Pharma industries will only improve if the pairing of AI technologies and human expertise complements each other. This allows teams to trust the intelligent tools they are working with to ensure the delivery of appropriate and personalised customer journeys for every patient.
“The future of CX in Life Sciences will rely heavily on creating a harmonised partnership between AI and human expertise. AI will accelerate precision while human professionals elevate trust, empathy, and clinical understanding,” Angel shared.
Intelligent generative and autonomous systems are only valuable if these tools are able to provide adequate support to human teams. Angel further commented that one way to achieve this is by designing customer journeys where AI enhances, rather than replaces, human capability.
She added, “This will empower field teams, service engineers and customer-service staff by pre-processing data, predicting needs and simplifying workflows.”
Building trust is another key factor in strengthening the teamwork between AI frameworks and their human counterparts to ensure that safety, algorithm transparency, validation, data privacy, and cybersecurity are built into intelligent systems from the start.
Most importantly, designing workflows using empathy-based principles is an excellent foundation to humanise AI systems from the ground up.
“No matter how advanced AI becomes, experiences must be designed so that AI handles speed, accuracy and pattern detection while humans handle complex emotions, ethical decisions and clinical nuance,” Angel explained.
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Dr Angel Lo’s insights show that, similar to many industries, the Medtech, Biotech, and Pharma space is also navigating the challenge of weaving innovative AI technologies with human-centred customer journeys, while maintaining empathy with every touch point.
Creating a foundation of trust between professionals and the intelligent tools will be one step in the right direction to enhancing CX in the Life Sciences industry across the APAC region.
