Biotech companies, their vendors, investors, and industryanalysts have descended upon San Francisco where severalbiotech-related conferences are underway.

Read: Wearables aren't as accurate as wethink

There’s also another group joining the party this year:pharmaceutical makers. They’re not there to sell anything, butrather to learn more about how wearable technology may help drivesales and marketing programs.

Wearable devices, such as those produced by San Francisco-basedFitbit, have raised expectations among investors and health careproviders since they appeared in the marketplace. But theirevolution in terms of deliverables has been rocky. The interestexpressed by Big Pharma in wearables signals that the devices mayhave applications that will appear in unanticipated areas.

According to Modern Healthcare, pharmaceuticalcompanies are prowling the various events to find out how they cantap into the wealth of wearables data to support their drug salesand marketing initiatives. These companies pay for considerableresearch into how the drugs they develop are used by consumers, andwhat effects, good and bad, the new drugs have on users.

Read: Pharma payments influence doctorprescriptions

But, as Modern Healthcare points out, much of thisresearch depends upon accurate patient reporting of the effects,and patient reporting tends to be subjective. Enterwearables.

If pharmaceutical companies can harness the power of real-time,or at least objective, reporting of the physical responses to newdrugs, they can short-circuit the often lengthy testing periods,and obtain more accurate information.

In addition, the companies see wearables as a better way torecruit patients for clinical trials. No more reporting to a site;the data will simply flow to the researchers, with essentially nointerruption of the patient’s daily routine.

“If you think about outcomes research, you really want tomeasure what's most relevant to patients,” Alicyn Campbell, globalhead for patient-centered outcomes research at San Francisco-basedGenentech, toldModern Healthcare. “There are a lot of concepts that arerelevant to patients that are difficult to measure right now. Wecan't ignore what's available right now in consumer wearables.”

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As with many of the other projected applications for wearables,using them for clinical tests won’t happen immediately. Issuesaround data privacy must be addressed, and the drugmakers will haveto negotiate reimbursement systems with insurers if they want torecoup the cost of the virtual trials.

But the promise of better results on an expedited timelinerepresents a powerful incentive for the drug companies to figurethose matters out. That’s why they’ve joined the biotech party inSan Francisco, where the unmapped future of wearables continues toevolve.