Oracle (NYSE: ORCL) and AstraZeneca announced a non-binding agreement to explore how AI and real-world data can be used to identify eligible patients for clinical trials, accelerate evidence generation, and bring research insights into clinical care workflows, according to a press release issued Oct. 20, 2026.

The collaboration plans to combine AstraZeneca's scientific and therapeutic expertise with Oracle's health data, cloud, AI, analytics, and clinical workflow capabilities. Initial disease areas under consideration include oncology, cardiovascular, renal and metabolic diseases, respiratory and immunology, and rare diseases.

Patient recruitment, described in the release as one of the largest obstacles in clinical trials, is a primary focus of the agreement. The companies plan to use AI-enabled tools to help care teams identify eligible patients earlier.

AstraZeneca Chief Executive Pascal Soriot said the collaboration is intended to "accelerate the journey from the discovery of medicine to patient care" by combining AstraZeneca's science with Oracle's data and technology capabilities.

Mike Sicilia, chief executive of Oracle, said the partnership aims to "help accelerate research, connect more patients to clinical trials, and ultimately bring relevant insights into care faster."

The two companies also intend to explore a continuous learning model in which insights from clinical research and routine care inform future study design, safety monitoring, and patient care. Shared governance structures, reusable technical components, and agreed outcome measures are planned to evaluate results and assess whether approaches could extend across additional disease areas and geographies.