Why early-stage biotechs should focus on data from day one

Aaron Steger
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As biotech R&D becomes more and more complex, you’re likely seeking software that will work for your team right now. That might mean finding a single application or program that can help perform a specific task or relying on email attachments to share key information with colleagues. But as a growing company, you know that the work you do is not only for today. It’s also for tomorrow. You want to set your organization up for long-term success—whether that’s profitability, acquisition, or IPO.

With this kind of success in mind, it’s vital to invest early in a unified, cloud-based informatics platform for all of your R&D processes. Here are the four most important reasons why a comprehensive digital solution can both help your organization thrive right now and set you up to grow and compete in the future.

Find the data you need

The old way

Manually recording experiment data in a variety of locations can soon lead to many tedious hours hunting for a specific piece of data, transferring information between platforms, and correcting errors.

The new solution

Standardizing how your team records large quantities of interrelated data and storing everything in a centralized, cloud-based platform significantly improves data accessibility and reliability and frees up scientists’ time for higher-value tasks.

Save time and resources in the lab

The old way

Complex tasks like lineage tracing and component mapping are extremely difficult to do well at scale in spreadsheets or paper notebooks. A lack of up-to-date information on samples and other inventory can cause significant delays, throttling scientific progress.

The new solution

A unified platform specifically designed to track the complexity and relationships of biological samples and reagents can make crucial data visible instantly, avoiding unnecessary confusion, extra work and reducing waste.

Work together as a team

The old way

When data is stored in a variety of formats and locations, hand-offs between scientists or teams can be extremely time-consuming and error-prone, while data silos make it difficult to derive crucial insights and pass on institutional knowledge.

The new solution

A single, cloud-based data platform instantly gives each scientist access to the data they need as well as an easy way to share results and communicate with colleagues.

Future-proof your business

The old way

Companies may invest in high-throughput lab instruments, for example, to automate some routine processes, but as long as the data in those instruments remains siloed, it is difficult to successfully iterate, innovate, and improve at scale.

The new solution

With a modern informatics platform, you can seamlessly connect experiment data, inventory, specialized processes, third-party software, and automated lab instruments, reducing unnecessary time spent in data capture, transfer and preparation while dramatically improving time to milestone.

The bottom line

If you’re an early-stage company, all this might seem too complicated and far-off, for now. But as the pace of biotech research accelerates, you may find that designing for growth right now is exactly what you need to stay competitive.

With Benchling, you are both accelerating innovation today and paving a path to a successful and impactful future.

The data shows it: In 2020 and so far in 2021, 1 in 5 biotech IPOs have come from Benchling customers.

Dive deeper into why growing biotechs should adopt a cloud R&D data platform now.

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