Fast release cycles almost made a SaaS company lose their pharma business and how they kept up with TestResults

The Challenge

NO TEST AUTOMATION COULD COVER THEIR NEEDS AND TECHNOLOGIES

As a software-as-a-service (SaaS) company, it’s essential to be agile with fast release cycles. As process management software is built with a myriad of technologies, no software test automation tool supports all of them. Scenarios like batch processing, email checks, process dependencies, and verification of PDF reports are all in the same test.

Manual testing took too long, resulting in release cycles of up to two years for pharmaceutical customers who are forced to comply with regulations. Because of this dilemma, the company was already evaluating whether to stop supporting the pharmaceutical sector, which would result in losing a promising market and revenue.

Two challenges: Reliable test tool and no adequate resources that are trained for test automation.

Besides being technology agnostic, the test automation tool they were looking for needed to help comply with GAMP 5 (Good Automated Manufacturing Practices), the standard for software used by pharma and life science companies.

The Solution

TECHNOLOGY-AGNOSTIC TEST AUTOMATION TO AUTOMATE ENTIRE USER JOURNEYS AND BUSINESS PROCESSES

TestResults does not depend on technology and interacts with the applications under test like a human so that it can automate entire user journeys across different technologies and applications. This includes checking email notifications triggered by various software events.

TestResults is pure black-box testing without any access to code or underlying technology. You can automate everything you interact with as a user, even third-party applications, operating systems, and technologies you don’t have access to the code. Something hard to automate before.

TestResults makes it super simple to automate software testing. First, there is one and the same approach for all types of applications. The test cases can be prompted, and test steps are generated in the context of your software automatically while still being maintainable.

Therefore, people without technical or engineering backgrounds can automate test cases without special certification. This gives them the needed flexibility in who does test automation.

The Result

FASTER RELEASE CYCLES WHILE COMPLYING WITH GAMP 5

They can now test their platform automatically and, therefore, keep up with fast release cycles and quicker time to market.

This allowed them to keep the pharmaceutical sector, resulting in a huge business potential as they can serve this market and keep their existing customers in this industry.

As they had no test automation engineer or developer available to automate the tests, the product owner and project manager automated them—with a fast learning curve. They were surprised at how fast test automation can be without a technical background. The first two test cases were automated within three days.

The more you automate, the faster you get, as more and more reusable blocks of your process are captured. Compared to other test automation solutions, customers report being up to 74% faster in test automation, no matter their background.

Most life science and pharmaceutical companies’ core business or processes depend on software. Even though most have test automation in place, they’re unable to test the entire user journey, as not all technologies are supported by the software test automation solution they’re using.

To comply with GAMP 5, you need a test automation solution that fulfills the regulations.