RAN BIOLINKS Partners with ACT-AEC to Modernize Clinical Trial Operations Across Canada

Toronto, Ontario, August 4th, 2026

RAN BIOLINKS a leading data-driven service provider for clinical research, today announced that it has been selected, following a stringent vendor evaluation process, to provide its MAESTRO Clinical Trials platform to the Clinical Trial Units (CTUs) and affiliated networks of Accelerating Clinical Trials - Accélérer les Essais Cliniques (ACT-AEC), Canada's pan-Canadian, CIHR-funded consortium dedicated to accelerating high-quality, high-impact clinical research across the country.

Under this agreement, MAESTRO Clinical Trials, RAN BioLinks' unified platform combining clinical trial management (CTMS), electronic trial master file (eTMF), and quality management system (QMS) capabilities will be made available to ACT-AEC's affiliated CTUs, research networks, and portfolio hospitals. The platform will connect, through a single standardized system, hundreds of researchers, trial coordinators, and biotechnology industry partners from Nova Scotia to British Columbia brought together by ACT-AEC, which is coordinated through the Population Health Research Institute (PHRI), a joint institute of McMaster University and Hamilton Health Sciences.

Key highlights

1. National Standardization: Giving ACT-AEC's 11 clinical trial units and affiliated networks access to a single, harmonized platform for study start-up, conduct, and oversight.

2. Accelerated Trial Timelines: Streamlining administrative processes — including ethics submissions, contracts, and protocol management — to reduce delays between trial approval and first-patient-in.

3. Stronger Data Governance: Providing a unified eTMF and QMS foundation to support regulatory readiness and audit preparedness across every affiliated trial site.

4. A More Competitive Canadian Trials Landscape: Equipping clinical trials professionals across the country with modern tooling designed to bring more clinical trials to Canada and get therapies to patients faster.

"Being chosen by ACT-AEC to power MAESTRO across its national network of clinical trial units is a defining moment for our team. It's a shared commitment to modernizing how clinical trials are run in Canada, from the ground up. We built MAESTRO with input from researchers who have lived through the operational bottlenecks that slow trials down, and we're proud to now put that platform to work for the CTUs, networks, and portfolio hospitals that make up the ACT-AEC community." Rad Aniba, Co-Founder and CEO, RAN BioLinks

"Selecting a technology partner for a national network of this scale required us to look closely at how a platform would actually perform across eleven clinical trial units with very different needs and workflows. MAESTRO stood out for its ability to bring trial management, document control, and quality processes together in one system, and for RAN BioLinks' willingness to work with our CTUs directly to configure it around real operational realities. This selection reflects months of evaluation and consultation with our network, and we're confident it gives our consortium the standardized foundation w_e set out to build." Alexander Lim, Accelerating Clinical Trials Consortium Manager

"Part of ACT's mandate has always been to close the gap between Canada's clinical trial community and its biotechnology sector, so that made-in-Canada innovations have a real path to the rigorous trials they need for regulatory approval. A shared platform like MAESTRO doesn't just make our clinical trial units more efficient, it makes it easier for Canadian biotech companies to partner with our networks and get their technologies into high-quality trials faster. That's a meaningful step toward a stronger, more self-sufficient clinical research ecosystem in this country." PJ Devereaux, ACT Co-Chair and PHRI Deputy Director and Senior Scientist

RAN BioLinks and ACT-AEC's collaboration is intended to give clinical trials professionals across Canada; investigators, coordinators, sponsors, and patient partners alike; a shared, modern foundation for running trials, with the broader goal of accelerating trial outcomes, strengthening Canada's clinical research ecosystem, and attracting more trials to the country. For more information about MAESTRO Clinical Trials and this collaboration, please visit https://www.ranbiolinks.com or contact us here: https://ranbiolinks.com/contact/

About RAN BioLinks

RAN BioLinks's mission is to make scientific research more accessible, efficient, and relevant. We help scientists and researchers find new ways to improve their work by taking over time-consuming operational tasks, building capacity around modern research methods, and connecting them with our network of experts and resources. With over 20 years of experience, RAN BioLinks provides research frameworks that combine operational systems, research implementation consulting, advanced analytics, biobanking platforms for clinical trials, data management services, automation tools, and expert support, enabling researchers to expedite their work. By ensuring that all scientific research can be accelerated, we can create a better future for patients.

About ACT-AEC

Accelerating Clinical Trials - Accélérer les Essais Cliniques (ACT-AEC) is a pan-Canadian consortium, funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), established to facilitate, optimize, and accelerate the conduct, implementation, and results translation of high-quality, high-impact randomized controlled trials to improve health in Canada and around the world. ACT-AEC connects hundreds of researchers from dozens of networks, several clinical trial units, and portfolio hospitals, along with patient partners, the biotechnology industry, government, and experts in research ethics, contracts, insurance, and regulatory processes spanning from Nova Scotia to British Columbia. ACT-AEC is coordinated by the Population Health Research Institute, a joint institute of McMaster University and Hamilton Health Sciences.