Technology adoption in pharmaceutical supply chain: A systematic literature review

The Pharmaceutical Supply Chain (PSC) is a complex and sensitive chain that requires to be managed effectively given its direct effects on public health and people’s lives. Introducing digital solutions within the key supply chain process and decision areas can certainly help make them more transparent, traceable and well-coordinated, as well as improve knowledge management among all participants in the PSC. However, the path to digital transformation still presents some challenges in terms of technology acceptance by organisations. In this paper we present a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) of the existing studies on the main acceptance models in the PSC and, in general, on the determinants of Digital Technology (DT) adoption by organisations. The resulting 94 articles were classified according to three dimensions: the DTs analysed, the key processes of the supply chain in which they were implemented, and the addressed acceptance and adoption factors. Despite the disparate benefits of the emerging DTs, the results show that there are still many barriers to their introduction into healthcare and specifically within the PSC. The most important ones turn out to be those relating to the compatibility of technology with existing systems, both from an organisational and technological point of view.