LaunchPharm: Pharma Platform Migration

LaunchPharm runs digital programs for pharmaceutical companies. Their biggest client is Sanofi's Dupixent dermatology team. The platform hosts medical content, streams conference events, and manages a user base of healthcare professionals across 67 countries.

When I came in, the platform was a patchwork. An events company had built the streaming portion and owned the authentication code. LaunchPharm had built a separate content platform and connected them through insecure iframes. The video section (DuTube) was another iframe. Updating content meant sending formatted text by email and waiting for someone to manually push it. They were paying the events company a recurring fee just to use infrastructure they didn't control.

I started with a free consultation recommending Strapi as a headless CMS. They followed the advice and it immediately made content management bearable. Then they brought me in to fix the rest.

The core job was migrating the entire platform off the vendor's infrastructure onto systems LaunchPharm actually owned. Strapi backend, React frontend, Kubernetes cluster on Hetzner with ArgoCD for GitOps. Self-hosted GitLab. Five environments: dev, stage, prod, demo, sandbox.

The user migration was the critical part. 2,000+ healthcare professionals across 67 countries, all with active accounts. We moved every single one without losing a single account. The only friction: users had to reset their password once. That was it.

Once the platform was on our own infrastructure, I built what was missing. Full-text search powered by Meilisearch so healthcare professionals could actually find content across the library. A chatbot that does RAG on their medical content, so users can ask questions and get answers grounded in their own material. Proper access controls and user approval workflows.

I also built DuTube as a standalone video platform: featured video carousel, event-based categorization, responsive player. No more iframes.

On the AI side, I deployed a Dify-based AI agent platform with a custom Next.js chat interface. Multi-LLM support, conversation history, workflow execution.

I managed two developers at different points. When the client reduced their budget, I made the hard calls on who to let go and when, restructuring the workload each time. I also handled the CyberVadis security evaluation, submitting all required documentation for their compliance process.

The platform now serves Sanofi's Dupixent dermatology programs. 2,000+ registered healthcare professionals. 67 countries. No more vendor lock-in, no more iframe nightmares, no more paying someone else to host your own product.