The first professional community dedicated to healthcare communications
procurement launches at MPiQ 2026 — and it was built from the inside out..
The combined media, marketing and medical communications budget is consistently
one of the largest indirect spend categories in life sciences and consumer health. It
shapes how medicines reach patients, how healthcare professionals are educated,
and how brands are built in one of the most regulated commercial environments on
earth. And yet, until now, the professionals managing that spend have had no
dedicated community to call their own. That changes on Wednesday 25 March 2026,
with the launch of the Healthcare Procurement Alliance at the Marketing
Procurement iQ conference, The Oval, London. Free to join for the first twelve
months at healthcareprocurement.org the Alliance is open to client-side
procurement professionals across pharma, biotech, med-tech and consumer health.
This is its story.
Why Now, and Why This
The gap has been hiding in plain sight for years. Procurement professionals working
in healthcare across R&D, medical and marketing communications categories have
found their way to cross-category procurement platforms, cross-industry marketing
procurement events, and technical conferences designed primarily for other
disciplines. A pharma-specific procurement event ran for nearly a decade before
folding in the early 2020s, and nothing came to replace it. The community has been
present at many tables but has never had one to call its own.
The impetus to act now comes from the Healthcare Communications Association's
(HCA) own work. As part of the Business Partnership Triangle research programme,
a two-year stakeholder consultation conducted in 2024 and 2025 to bridge the gaps
between procurement, business and agency partners, the procurement workgroup
made a discovery that was both obvious and underexplored: procurement
professionals needed to align internally before they could align effectively with their
agency and business partners. There is no dedicated channel for knowledge
sharing, no common resource base, no collective voice. The level of
professionalisation is variable across the discipline. That is not a criticism of
individuals. It is a structural problem. Without a mechanism to cross-fertilize and
benchmark, knowledge and best practice in this discipline travel primarily when
individuals move organisations.
When the founding team of the Alliance, all procurement professionals working in the
sector, spoke to peers about what was needed, three things came up repeatedly.
First: "I would love to speak to someone else doing my job when I am stuck — but I
don't know who they are. Sometimes I need a sounding board, and sometimes I just
need a tool or template, but what exists is too generic for our sector." Second:
"There is nowhere to discuss topics specific to our industry. Our regulatory
environment makes marketing and communications procurement look quite different,
even from other regulated sectors." Third: "Building this network would help develop
the talent pipeline. People could connect, find opportunities, raise their profiles. A
stronger community makes for a stronger discipline." Those three observations are
the beating heart of what we have now started to build.
What Has Been Built: A New Home for Healthcare Procurement
The Healthcare Procurement Alliance has been established under the auspices of
the Healthcare Communications Association (HCA), and with the support of
Marketing Procurement iQ. It is a non-profit, procurement-led professional
community. The founding chair is Helen Thompson, formerly of Amgen. The
founding leadership team includes members in procurement roles at leading
organisations, forming a group with deep collective experience across some of the
most complex communications procurement portfolios in the sector.
Membership is open to client-side procurement professionals across pharma,
biotech, medical devices, med-tech, consumer healthcare, those in adjacent sectors
and disciplines, and those with an interest to enter the sector. We will span R&D,
medical and marketing communications procurement in all its breadth, including (but
not restricted to): medical affairs, medical information, medical communications and
writing, regulatory services, creative and digital agencies, media, production, PR,
congress and events, data and market research, mar tech and SaaS. Adjacent
client-side functions and independent procurement consultants and contractors
working primarily in client-side roles are also welcome. The Alliance is a closed
environment for procurement professionals only: agencies, large consultancies and
supplier organisations are not eligible, and that boundary is what makes genuine
peer sharing possible.
The Alliance does not stand alone. Under the HCA's coordinating structure,
equivalent communities exist for all three sides of the Business Partnership Triangle.
For the first time, all three stakeholder groups have dedicated leadership
communities — and a direct line to one another at the top.
What Membership Gives You
Membership delivers value on three levels.
The first is internal: a genuine peer network of professionals who share your context:
the regulatory constraints, the agency landscape, the compliance requirements
specific to this sector. Peer support when you are facing a novel challenge. Access
to sector-specific tools, templates, benchmark data and trend surveys. A forum for
topics that don’t get airtime in a cross-industry setting. Opportunities to contribute to
thought leadership through research, publications and events, raising individual
profiles and the visibility of procurement as a strategic function. A collective
intelligence that grows over time, built by the community, for the community.
The second is external. Through the Alliance's connection to the Agencies Alliance
and Industry Alliance, members have a direct channel to their agency and industry
counterparts. Procurement can surface questions, seek guidance, share feedback
and co-develop solutions with agency and business leaders — not informally and ad
hoc, but through a structure built for exactly that purpose. This is procurement with a
seat at the table when industry-wide challenges are being shaped. What no single
stakeholder can perhaps achieve working alone, this community can pursue
together. “Together for Better” is the HCA's philosophy. Now it can be ours too.
The third is tangible and immediate. The Alliance's first output is the Partnership
Triangle Playbook, developed in partnership with business and agency partners
through the two-year research programme. Built around three pillars, transparency,
value and relationship, it takes members through eight chapters: from an honest
assessment of shared challenges, through seven guiding principles for effective
collaboration, to practical tools, ready-to-use frameworks and a call to action for each
stakeholder group. It is not a vision document. It is designed to be used. Members
will also benefit from discounted rates for MPiQ and HCA events, and an editorial
agenda shaped directly by member needs.
Join Now, Get Involved
The Procurement Alliance will launch at a special session at MPiQ conference on
Wednesday 25 March at The Oval, London. The session will introduce the Alliance’s
2026 plans, present the Playbook, and begin the conversation about how members
will shape the community’s direction. The founding team has built the structure. What
goes into it belongs to everyone who joins.
Membership is free for the first twelve months, and you can join now at
www.healthcareprocurement.org If you work in client-side procurement in life sciences or
consumer health and have ever wished there were a community of people who truly
understand what you do, this is it. Come to the session. Sign up. Help build
something this discipline has needed for a long time.