If harnessed appropriately, big data has the potential to drive the next era of science, according to Elemental Machines’ Chief Commercial Officer, Robert Pemberton. This will thrust a whole new group of decisions and responsibilities onto lab managers, he continued. Elemental Machines serves to connect labs so that lab managers and business leaders can harness the full transformative power of big data in the future.
Pemberton presented during a session titled “Why data maturity is essential to the Lab of the Future” at the Lab of the Future USA Congress, held March 22 & 23, 2022 in Boston. In the presentation, Pemberton discussed the 5 stages of laboratory data transformation.
1. Elementary
In this stage, some equipment data is available albeit siloed. Furthermore, some assets are unconnected, and as such, the data is unavailable or must be compiled manually. In this situation, accuracy is a major concern and all individuals who need the data might not be able to gain access.
2. Irregular
Here, sensors are deployed throughout the entire lab for complete connectivity. However, the data strategy might be disjointed or confusing, because data is siloed or data volume is overwhelming as to cloud real insights.
3. Championed
Biotech leaders often fall under this category, where they have a data strategy and vision. Data is often contained within a single united dashboard, which leverages algorithms to detect and alert about anomalies. Lab leaders who conduct analysis are still essential in this scenario.
4. Committed
Executives have buy-in at this level and can drive organizational-wide changes. Both business and lab decisions are made based on real data. Labs use artificial intelligence to predict and find the root cause of problems.
5. Transformative
In the last stage, data and artificial intelligence are central to discovery, which is a fully automated process that does not need human involvement.
Data from everything in the lab must be collected for not only alerting and monitoring but also utilization for the last stage to become a reality. The on/off data from equipment in the lab can provide lab decision-makers with invaluable information and potentially lucrative cost savings from gained efficiencies in service plans, warranties, and asset decommissioning.
For a large pharmaceutical company, this could translate into hundreds of millions of dollars in savings without changing operations or equipment at all. Utilization, therefore, is a seemingly simple solution with seismic implications for the LabOps community.
Following Pemberton’s presentation with a practical application of this concept, Noelle Strubczewski, associate director of equipment management and reliability at Ultragenyx Pharmaceuticals discussed how the company is working to improve global asset management programs. Strubczewski is leading the charge at Ultragenyx to implement data-driven asset management with utilization at the core of the initiative.
Measuring utilization with power monitors and condition assessments can inform various aspects of asset management including:
Decommissioning equipment (low utilization/high repair)
- Repositioning lab equipment
- Asset sharing
- Planning capital spend
- Predictive monitoring based on condition
- Sustainability (energy and space conservation)
Learn more about Elemental Machines’ utilization tool or try it free for 30 days now!