2026 Life Sciences Outlook

Surveyed medtech executives tend to be more optimistic about the future than their biopharma peers, while anticipating similar revenue growth (81%). There is no statistically significant difference between the growth expectations of medtech executives in the United States (84%) and those in several countries outside the United States (78%), suggesting a broadly consistent outlook across geographies.

While overall optimism is evident among both biopharma and medtech executives for 2026, this positivity is tempered by persistent geopolitical tensions, pricing pressures, and regulatory shifts that complicate growth strategies and operating models. The prevailing US-focused growth strategy appears to be giving way to a more fragmented and complex global landscape.¹ Companies are beginning to carefully weigh nuanced decisions about which products to advance, where to launch them, and how to set their prices.² Some structural characteristics and existing portfolio strategies can serve as an advantage. As one European corporate strategy executive sums up: “[The outlook is] uncertain for sure, but I would say neutral to positive. In these times, if you have a diversified footprint, you can build that agility muscle to react without being completely dependent on one thing.”

Another perspective comes from Gabriele Ricci, chief data and technology officer at Takeda Pharmaceuticals, who notes, “Volatility fuels innovation,” reflecting a readiness to embrace and adapt to a dynamic landscape and to drive progress amid ongoing uncertainty. He adds, “We’re all entering a period of purposeful transformation, where discipline and innovation must coexist as the industry matures beyond hype toward measurable productivity from AI and data.”

In response to rapidly shifting dynamics, surveyed executives identified a set of interlinked strategies—from advancing digital transformation and managing regulatory change to optimizing pricing and portfolio management. The following sections highlight the areas executives consider most important for maintaining growth and resilience in 2026.

Survey respondents identify several major trends that will most likely influence their organizations’ operational strategies in 2026 (figure 2).

• Growing regulatory and policy influence: Regulation was the most frequently cited trend expected to shape organizational strategy. One in two non-US respondents (51%) pointed to national regulatory changes—such as the EU AI Act, the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, the European Health Data Space, and China’s volume-based procurement program³—that could affect market access, pricing, and reimbursement models. In the United States, 36% of respondents highlighted agency restructuring within the Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services, while 39% cited economic policy changes, including tariffs. These factors might also shape how leaders think about pricing and portfolio management decisions in the year ahead.
• Acceleration of digital transformation and AI: Nearly half of respondents (48%) identified accelerated digital transformation as a trend that is likely to have a substantial impact on their organizations in 2026—a statistically significant increase compared with 2025. The proliferation of generative AI, identified by 41% of respondents as an influential trend, highlights how analytics and automation are increasingly shaping research, manufacturing, and commercial operations. Notably, 30% cited agentic AI—AI systems that can act autonomously to achieve goals, make decisions, and perform tasks—a new survey category this year, signaling growing interest in advanced digital capabilities. Despite these investments, only 22% of life sciences leaders said they have successfully scaled AI, and just 9% reported achieving significant returns on these efforts.
  Cybersecurity concerns are also on the rise, with 35% of respondents saying it will affect their strategy.
• Persistent pricing, access, and portfolio pressures: Pricing and access to medications, therapies, and medical technologies remain major strategic considerations for 44% of respondents—a slight change from last year’s Life Sciences Outlook. Other key trends expected in 2026 include increased competitive pressure from generics and biosimilars (cited by 37% of respondents), as well as the expiration of blockbuster drugs and impending patent cliffs (mentioned by 26%).
• Heightened geopolitical and economic uncertainty: Concern about geopolitical tensions has risen sharply, with 39% of respondents naming it as a top issue—a jump of 20 percentage points from last year and the largest increase among all tracked trends. Nearly the same share of respondents (38%) identified inflation, broader economic pressures, and supply chain risks as factors likely to shape organizational strategies in 2026.
• Evolving customer models and needs: One-third of respondents (33%) said connected care delivery is a top trend for 2026—a rise of 15 percentage points year over year. Customer adoption of digital tools was cited by 35% of executives, while evolving customer needs and preferences were cited by 32%, highlighting the ongoing shift in care delivery and engagement models. As a supply chain executive from a large US medtech company put it, “There aren’t enough phlebotomists or lab managers. Our customers don’t have enough people capacity. We need to automate things for them and make it cost-effective.”

Biopharma and medtech leaders generally anticipate that AI will help boost organizational efficiency in 2026, with 78% expecting it to play a central role in driving major change. In fact, 29% of biopharma leaders and 31% of medtech leaders plan to use AI tools or training to help improve workforce productivity.

Achieving AI maturity remains aspirational for most organizations in 2026. While many are actively undertaking major transformations to adapt to AI-driven ways of working, none report having fully completed this journey. The greatest progress has been in integrating AI tools into daily workflows to enhance productivity: 14% of the surveyed executives report full implementation, and another 40% are currently working toward this goal. Surveyed executives from organizations that are further along the AI maturity continuum express greater optimism about the economy, the industry, and their own financial performance.

Among biopharma executives, 41% cited improving R&D productivity as their top priority for managing costs, reflecting persistent industry headwinds and rising costs. As the average cost of bringing a new drug to market now tops $2 billion,⁴ the emphasis on R&D productivity signals the importance of retooling drug development models and accelerating time to market. Meanwhile, medtech leaders plan to prioritize operational efficiency, with 47% of respondents indicating that AI implementation will be their primary cost-containment strategy in 2026. 

When it comes to pricing, access, contracting, and reimbursement, 29% of biopharma leaders and 37% of medtech leaders say these will be key areas of focus for their organizations. This emphasis is most often linked to key external trends such as pricing and access to drugs and devices, ongoing regulatory changes, and manufacturing and supply chain risks. Surveyed executives prioritizing pricing and market access activities are more likely to apply these efforts to their existing product portfolios, alongside new customer engagement and sales enablement models. 

• Renewed focus on mergers and acquisitions: After a recent lull, strategic partnerships, mergers and acquisitions are rising on the growth agenda: 45% of surveyed biopharma leaders and 51% of medtech leaders see M&A as a top near-term strategic priority. In biopharma, appetite is returning for pipeline expansion and early-stage assets, with aggregate deal value in the first three quarters of 2025 ($91.9 billion) already exceeding the total for 2024 ($61.7 billion).⁵ “More deals are getting done in the latter part of 2025 compared to the last few years. That is good for the market overall and for a company like ours, because those of us on a growth trajectory require considerable capital,” notes Shankar Musunuri, chairman, CEO, and co-founder of Ocugen. In medtech, M&A activity rebounded in 2024 and 2025, with some firms pursuing high-growth small and mid-cap companies, particularly in diagnostics, cardiovascular, and orthopedics.⁶

• AI as a growth engine: AI appears to be evolving from a productivity tool into a growth catalyst for life sciences organizations. Leaders tend to recognize that future competitiveness is likely to depend on how effectively they harness AI to fundamentally reimagine how their organizations work, make decisions, and deliver value—a view shared by nearly 80% of surveyed executives. Respondents see investments in AI-enabled platforms as a key growth driver for 2026, particularly among medtech executives (53%, compared with 39% in biopharma), as organizations move from pilot projects to redesigning processes and embedding AI across all aspects of operations.⁷ In medtech, AI-driven diagnostics is expected to be a top product development priority for 2026, while health IT and AI-enhanced workflow solutions are seen as immediate revenue drivers by 82% of executives. “AI is already out of the box, and the speed at which innovation is moving will only accelerate. The complexity will be—will regulators, governing bodies, and even healthcare systems be able to catch up?” says William Phillips, chief commercial officer of Terumo Neuro.