Big Pharma's Friend

Peter Gassner rebooted Veeva Systems, and his gambit has created the ultimate pharmaceutical tool.

- Alex Konrad

In the summer of 2010, when his startup, Veeva Systems, was just three years old, CEO Peter Gassner summoned his team to deliver a surprising message: It was time to think about a second act. Veeva was on a roll. It had become indispensable to Big Pharma companies, who were embracing at a fast clip its software for tracking sales and customers. But to build a lasting business, Gassner believed, Veeva had to think bigger. “Batten down the hatches here,” Gassner recalls saying. “We’re in for six years of a hard slog.”

The gambit has more than paid off. Bolstered by that second act—an entirely new product called Veeva Vault that helps the likes of AbbVie and Merck manage the process of drug development and clinical trials—Veeva has seen its sales grow an average of 37% over the past three years to $544 million in the most recent fiscal year. No enterprise software company other than Salesforce has topped the $500 million sales mark faster than Veeva, which ranks No. 8 on Forbes’ Fast Tech 25 list of America’s fastest-growing public tech companies.