Case Study: Ionis Pharmaceuticals achieves 250% increase in invoice processing and global, compliant paperless P2P with Coupa Software

Scaling a Global Pharmaceutical Business with Coupa

Ionis Pharmaceuticals, a publicly traded life‑sciences company, outgrew its centralized, manual, paper‑based procure‑to‑pay processes. Rapid growth, strict regulatory requirements, and a need to digitize globally strained a small finance team with limited resources and hindered operational agility.

Ionis implemented Coupa Procurement, Contracts, and Invoicing to digitize its business‑spend management. The paperless P2P solution delivered immediate time‑to‑value, enabled full audit compliance, scaled global operations, and boosted throughput—about a 250% increase in invoices (≈30,000/year), roughly 1,000 POs per month, and major efficiency gains without adding headcount.

Ionis Pharmaceuticals

Isaac Ballesteros

Assistant Director of Accounting