2021: A new era of lab automation

Lab automation is expected to continue to infiltrate labs over the coming years, with new technologies being developed and adopted. However, several challenges need to be addressed before lab automation can reach its full potential.

Laboratory automation has transformed laboratories over the past 40 years. From its humble beginnings in the 1980s, technology has made its way into clinical laboratories throughout the world. It has allowed laboratories to perform more tests, a greater variety of tests, with fewer staff, and lower cost per test. It has also has changed how laboratories work, particularly within the clinical space. That has created conflict in how laboratories look at themselves, what tests are offered, and how staff are deployed, creating challenges even as laboratories have been able to save money and improve service with this technology.

Recent reports have valued the total global lab automation market at USD 4.3 billion in 2020. This is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 5.2 percent between now and 2025, reaching a value of USD 5.5 billion. This rapid growth is being mostly driven by the rising demand for higher accuracy of test results.

Automation has moved past the nice to have to the must have in the modern laboratory. Laboratory teams today are continually looking for ways to increase their efficiency, and improve the long-term value of their operations. Organizations are now adopting laboratory automation solutions to enhance their work and maximize the efficiency of their testing processes.

Also, advances in available automation technology from some of the industry’s major players, such as Siemens AG, Honeywell, and Schimadzu, amongst others, boost the adoption of automated technologies by more laboratories worldwide.

In the US, in particular, there has been increased spending on healthcare, which leads to the improvement of research and development processes, including clinical trials.

The improvement of clinical trials has led to a growing interest in automation, which is being brought in to improve the quality and accuracy of testing protocols. This alone will act as a major driver of lab automation in the coming years.

Asia-Pacific is the region representing the fastest area of growth now and over the next five years. Companies here are making significant advances in available technology, and labs are seeing the value of adding these technologies into their methodologies.

The major players in the global lab automation market are Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc., PerkinElmer Inc, Agilent Technologies, Danaher Corporation, F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd., and Tecan Group Ltd.

Digital transformation drives change in companies across industries, improving their operations and outputs. With this, the most popular lab trends involve a solution that automates traditional processes. Many of these are manual and semi-manual.

No matter the industry – production companies, biopharmaceuticals, manufacturing – laboratories in various sectors continue to prioritize paperwork to conduct research. While other departments automate their workflows, lab workers must also look to technological solutions.

Companies – by applying cutting-edge tech in laboratories – are about to change this.

Trends in the laboratory will continue to evolve but are expected to focus on prevailing issues of collaboration, connectivity, and productivity. Additional lab trends will involve cybersecurity and worker safety, through new technologies and strategies, aiming to make the facility efficient and profitable.

Some of the emerging trends expected to transform labs in 2021 include:
Smarter data management. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) algorithms have already demonstrated their value. From predicting analysis to better data aggregation, they help managers draw detail-based conclusions. They also help make decisions based on insights otherwise dependent on extensive calculations.

For laboratories, especially those at biopharmaceutical companies, algorithms can speed up product development. This, in turn, improves the development of critical new medicines for patients.

Until recently, medicine development relied on human intelligence and researchers’ decision making. Now, AI can change this. Using various data sets and input from previous research, algorithms can propose solutions. These originate from observed patterns. An example of this approach is Bayer’s CTEPH recognition. This uses AI algorithms to learn from mistakes.

Greater emphasis on safety. Worker safety is a leading cause of concern among laboratories and staff. With increased sanitary protocols, lab management will face increased demands for maintaining rigorous processes, staff accountability, and social distancing on the lab floor. Contact tracing and safety checks will be present more on an organizational level, whereas automation of laborious and contact-intensive tasks, such as sample registration, will benefit from new solutions.

Digital-based collaborations. Many labs now take precautionary measures to prevent the spread of infectious diseases. To combat this, teams often operate on a rotating basis, with certain members of staff remaining at-distance from the lab facility. Cloud-based solutions can provide laboratory staffs from different departments and facilities with access to the same data as the frontline lab worker. This enables organization-wide assistance for larger projects, with opportunities to carry out team-based assignments and procedures.

Remote assistance is also increasingly possible thanks to digital tools, including video recording and streaming. Such tools are particularly useful when onboarding new staff or when introducing team members to new projects.

Mobile LIMS. One can assure greater mobility within the lab and beyond with mobile LIMS class systems. Thermo Fisher Scientific offers lab workers and scientists SampleManager Mobile 3.0. This mobile application offers the functionalities of LIMS, but with the prospect of conducting research in the field.

Researchers can access standard features, like mobile-LES, to follow external SOPs. This way, they can enjoy greater connectivity without compromising the quality of research.

More pre-configured systems. Improving laboratory operations is a must. This applies to all companies still relying on outdated processes, workflows, and tools. Some of them realized that they must act quickly. This is because some want to achieve faster ROI in new systems like LIMS.

For this reason, labs are increasingly looking for pre-configured solutions with industry-standard capabilities. This can reduce the introduction time of new systems, yielding immediate results.

Luckily, user can implement solutions as out-of-the-box systems. Alternatively, they can hire consultants to match the needs of a given lab. This solution reduces the time of LIMS implementation at a laboratory.

Augmented Reality is this new reality. Dedicated systems, web, and mobile apps have already been around for a while. But what about taking lab connectivity a step further? This is now possible with augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR) solutions.

An innovative solution to the latter option is Holo4Labs. The MR interface connects Thermo Scientific SampleManager LIMS software with Microsoft HoloLens. The advantage of this solution is that the interface overlays on top of what scientists see. A less preferable option is through creating a separate AR platform. This way, researchers can continue their work. It enables the advantage of eye-level digital information in an MR setting. That in turn allows for stepping through SOPs and recording observations without interruption.

Cloud-based solutions. LIMS class systems use holistic lab connectivity in workstations, devices, and data sources. Cloud databases make this possible, which will maintain their value in modern laboratories.

Why this matters is because it allows us to scale and maintain robust systems. This enables multiple integrations, data management, analytics, and more.

Companies will also continue to adopt cloud deployments to achieve agility and scalability. This helps lower IT costs, and ensures easier upgrades and ongoing system maintenance.

More efficient instrument maintenance. Managing instruments in laboratories is essential but mundane, which lab managers must remember. Calibrations and scheduling maintenance can be more comfortable – or automated – with digital systems.

Laboratories using instrument telemetry data can increase uptime by predicting part failures. This aids in replacing or scheduling maintenance for items reaching their end-of-life. Users can achieve routine maintenance and support using AR technology.

More agile QA/QC. Quality assurance (QA) and quality control (QC) will no longer take place at the end of a process. Instead, KPI checks will take place along process points. This more agile approach will handle errors or mistakes without affecting further processes. This responsive method will, therefore, help to reduce waste and delays in production.

Clinical laboratories have played a critical role in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, drawing attention to the work laboratory professionals do as never before. In addition to fulfilling the current testing needs, laboratories have an unprecedented responsibility to prepare for the pandemic’s aftermath.

The pandemic has also put enormous pressure on clinical laboratories — from increased testing volumes and turnaround time to biosafety, workforce planning, and social distancing within the lab. As of December 2020, across the industry total testing volumes were 245 percent of baseline. Routine testing, which saw a drop of 66 percent in the early days of the pandemic, is now already over 100 percent of pre-pandemic baseline levels (in the US), while COVID-19 and routine testing volume combined is just under 250 percent of baseline. Industry experts predict substantial COVID-19 testing throughout 2021 and even into 2022, and an increase in highly sensitive antibody testing as the number of people vaccinated rises.

Workflow automation, an important breakthrough in the recent history of laboratory diagnostics, integrates multiple diagnostic specialties to one single track to improve efficiency, organization, standardization, quality, and safety of laboratory testing. The major economic revenue of workflow automation, resulting from merging many diagnostic platforms within a consolidated system, not only encompasses a reduction of manual workforce (especially auxiliary and technical staff) needed for managing high-volume testing, but is also attributable to lower pre-analytical and post-analytical expenditures.

Automation plays a key role in addressing staff shortages while enabling precious resources to focus on high-value clinical tasks, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic. Even though molecular testing, which is the gold standard for diagnosing COVID-19, is not included in current workflow automation solutions, automating manual processes for routine tests free up lab resources to do more COVID-19 or other dedicated scientific work. In labs that process fewer than 5000 tests a day, there are maybe one or two technicians on staff, making workflow automation even more vital.

The good news for many labs, already equipped with automation technology and innovation, is the built-in capabilities and scalability they may have available to help overcome many of the COVID-19-related challenges. This includes physical laboratory automation systems used to automate and reduce the number of process steps and manual touchpoints, and then to expedite the physical handling, sorting, and distribution of samples. It also includes software-based lab IT solutions to automate and optimize workflows associated with generating patient and QC results and the visualization and management of all the information they need. Those laboratories, already leveraging the benefits of total lab automation to perform multidisciplinary testing, have been well equipped to not only accommodate the need for serology-based antibody testing, but also the incremental volume of coagulation, hematology, and immunochemistry testing necessary for patients impacted by COVID-19.

While automation is a reality today for large laboratories, the available solutions are neither total nor wholly automated for small- and medium-sized labs.

COVID-19 has highlighted the need for small- and medium-sized labs to cater to populations that do not have easy or fast access to large laboratories. In the future, the drive to consolidate will have to be balanced against the need to have adequate geographic coverage for testing. This means that small- and medium-sized labs will continue to see a rise in test volumes without an increase in resources, making automation an attractive option. The lab automation that caters to labs processing high volumes of samples is out of reach for smaller-volume labs due to space requirements and infrastructure constraints.

The right fit for these labs is a solution that offers a comprehensive workflow automation that: reduces manual steps through pre-analytical, analytical, and post-analytical automation, conserving precious human resources to do higher-value clinical tasks while fitting within the space constraints; adapts to meet a mid-volume lab’s space requirements and infrastructure needs with a flexible design; and dynamically calculates route scheduling for rapid and consistent turnaround time (TAT), with short turnaround times (STATs) always prioritized to deliver results faster with intelligent routing.

Just because a lab is not processing a large number of samples should not mean it has to sacrifice the benefits of intelligent laboratory automation, and settle for a marginally automated work cell plus solution. The market is ready for workflow automation that can help small and medium-sized labs meet the testing needs of their community.

From scope to implementation – choosing the right vendor. An automation vendor takes a laboratory’s goal and turns it into reality. This makes choosing the right partner for such a major undertaking a critical decision. Key considerations include the breadth of the vendor’s offering across different application areas and departments, and whether they fully understand your science. Do they have the necessary solutions for cross-science application, with experience in your sector and across each of the three laboratory automation pillars? Automation solutions also need to be configurable, flexible, and easy to support, rather than risking the creation of a monolithic bespoke system that cannot adapt to evolving needs.

When it comes to implementation, a vendor’s ability to provide different types of training, delivered in multiple formats to match the needs of personnel at all levels and in all geographies, is of the utmost importance. So too is post-installation service and support for all users. It pays to explore topics, such as support channels, on-line help, community forums, response times, and local resources.

Increasingly important is the issue of environmental impact. With respect to the automation solution itself, there are some key questions to ask. Does it allow for miniaturization and consumables re-use? Can it separate waste streams to maximize materials recovery and ensure responsible waste treatment? Will it support efforts to minimize consumables and reagent usage, and actively manage user’s effect on the environment? As buyers strive to reduce their own environmental impact, so the credentials of suppliers and the systems they provide must also be evaluated.

Digital transformation is the foremost of the emerging laboratory trends. But as laboratory managers seek to make progress, they will need to embrace new strategies that regard worker safety through distancing, whilst also maintaining consistent levels of output.

By focusing on collaborative solutions and automation, users can reduce dependencies on manual tasks and focus on delivering the highest product quality possible. For instance, paperwork is obsolete and should be minimized.

With digital systems, user can reduce waste, delays, and improve productivity and safety. All items will ensure the full connectivity of devices and teams. After all, users already have access to vast amounts of data. But are they using it to its full potential?

Ultimately, laboratory trends will consider an emphasis on safety, security, and collaboration among different lab technicians. As each year shows, 2021 is filled with strategic and productive opportunity!