Last week, we added IQVIA Holdings (NYSE: IQV) to our portfolio. The company was previously known as QuintilesIMS until November 15. On that date, the company changed its name and stock symbol to their present form. The company itself was formed via merger in 2016 between Quintiles and IMS Health, combining the businesses of clinical research and health information technologies.

IQVIA’s IT infrastructure processes more than 65 billion healthcare transactions per year. This allows the company to amass a huge database of healthcare information on more than 530 million (anonymous) patient records. These records contain information on prescription, sales, promotion data, medical claims, electronic medical records, and social media.

Information is valuable. Access to IQVIA’s information can help its clients make better informed decisions in every stage of a drug’s life cycle, from research & development to marketing.

Clinical studies that run more smoothly helps a drug candidate receive regulatory approval faster. And once a drug is approved, analysis of information can help to drive sales. Pre-launch, better information helps a drug company make better pricing and branding decisions. During a launch, information helps managers best allocate their resources and adjust their sales strategy. And once a drug is on the market, data analysis can reveal important information that helps a drug sell better.

Clinical trials have increased in complexity over the past decade, and it is common for them to experience time delay and cost overruns. The largest immediate benefit to the merger is that it differentiates IQVIA from other contract research organizations (CRO) because no other CROs can match the access to the wealth of data IQVIA can offer.

IQVIA’s main market opportunities consist of outsourced research and development, real-world evidence and connected health, and technology-enabled commercial operations.

Outsourced research and development is what we’ve already discussed. It is more cost-effective for many drug companies, particularly smaller ones, to hire a third party such as IQVIA to conduct clinical trials on their behalf. The wealth of information it possesses gives the company an edge.

Real-World Evidence refers to the collection of data relating to patient health status and the status of health care. Connected health refers to using technology to deliver healthcare services remotely. IQVIA estimates the total addressable market of these areas is about $120 billion.

Technology enabled commercial operations refer to the data warehousing, IT outsourcing, software applications and other services in the broader market for IT services. This area even includes services like recruiting, training, deploying and managing sales forces, channel management and many others.

In all, IQVIA offers hundreds of distinct services, applications and solutions to help clients make better decisions.

Revenue growth is expected to be in the mid- to high-single digits per year while earnings per share should be in the mid-teens per year (both in percentage terms). The growth in life sciences should lead to steadily growing demand for more information analytics and for more clinical activity so there’s upside to those projections.

Our initial suggested buy-up-to price for IQV is $112.