The number of companies working on disruptive innovation has increased substantially over the past few years and investment in this sector is massive. Pharmaceutical companies and CROs need to change how they look at everything they do across the entire spectrum of drug development. By adopting disruptive innovation, interventions can be made at each stage of the clinical development process to radically change and improve the way clinical trials are designed and conducted, to the benefit of the industry and, most importantly, patients.