What’s New in Veeva Vault 26R1?
The Veeva Vault 26R1 release is set to arrive on 17 April, introducing new features and key issue fixes.
Bright Affect has taken an early look at the Clinical updates to pinpoint what will matter most to your end users. This article will examine the eTMF Archive Readiness Dashboard, the Study Start-Up Milestone Planning View and the Milestone Document Panel which spans CTMS, eTMF, and Study Start-Up.
The eTMF Archive Readiness Dashboard: A Smarter Way to Prepare for Archival
The eTMF Archive Readiness Dashboard reshapes preparing for archival. The dashboard replaces the usual process with something closer to a live diagnostic instrument panel.
Rather than waiting until the end of a study to assess completeness, the system continuously evaluates the state of the Trial Master File. It identifies unclassified documents, active workflows, open issues, and incomplete milestones into a single view. This is set out like an interactive workspace, where each data point leads directly to the underlying task requiring attention.
We believe that the practical implications will be significant. Teams can reduce last-minute delays, improve audit confidence, and distribute workload more evenly across the study timeline. The act of archiving will now be more controlled and therefore rigorous.
Find out more about this feature here.
The Milestone Document Panel: Document Completeness Built In
One of the typical challenges in clinical operations is the disconnect between operational progress and document completeness. Systems like CTMS track milestones and activities, while eTMF manages documents and compliance, but the relationship between the two has often required manual interference.
The Milestone Document Panel in both the CTMS and eTMF systems alleviates this need by including document visibility directly within the context of milestones. For any milestone, users can immediately see which documents are expected, which have been completed, and which remain outstanding. This creates a direct link between what has been done and what has been documented. It is visible as a document panel on the Doc Info page and uses Milestone Document records to show the Milestone data as a grid, with searching and filtering options.
At Bright Affect, we see this feature as an opportunity for compliant connectivity. A Milestone can no longer be considered complete simply because activities have been checked off. It must also meet the corresponding document requirements. It will also strengthen governance across study teams. Study managers gain clearer visibility into readiness at each stage, quality teams can intervene earlier when gaps appear, and collaboration becomes more deliberate with real-time data.
For more information on the Milestone Document Panel, visit the Veeva website here.
The Milestone Planning View: Smarter Study Start-Up Planning
While the previous two features focus on execution, the Study Start-Up Milestone Planning View addresses the planning phase. Study start-up is often a complex process including dependencies involving regulatory approvals, site activation, and country-specific processes.
The Planning View makes this complex process simpler with a system-integrated timeline, including a table view and a dynamic Gantt chart. It allows teams to define milestone dependencies and visualise the project timeline within the same environment where execution will occur. This creates a continuity between planning and action that can sometimes be hard to achieve.
We anticipate this being a useful new feature, as it is embedded within the broader Vault ecosystem, meaning the plan evolves alongside the study. Changes in Milestone status, delays, or accelerations are reflected in real time, letting your teams adjust proactively rather than reactively. By making dependencies explicit and visible, it becomes easier to identify bottlenecks and manage the critical path.
To read more about the Milestone Planning View, see the Veeva website here.
How can Bright Affect help you?
If you’d like any more information about how these features, or how any of the 26R1 enhancements will affect your Vault users, please get in touch. You can review Veeva’s overview on What’s New in 26R1for Clinical users here.
