ALAN MARCUS
Chief Growth Officer, LabVantage Solutions, Inc., USA

Abstract

Artificial intelligence and machine learning are bringing digital transformation in labs to the next level, helping to fuel the emergence of “the lab of the future.”
Rather than focusing on data collection, the lab of the future enables data analysis, which in turn helps companies identify important lessons, insights, warnings, and opportunities coded inside scientific data. In the lab, this means greater efficiency and speed-to-market; in the boardroom, it means scientific data is available to support critical decision-making; on a global scale, it positions labs to help address humankind’s most complex and dynamic problems.

INTRODUCTION
Whether your lab is still bound by paper-based processes or you’ve planted a flag in the metaverse, you’re likely feeling pressure to take your digital tools to a new level and become a “lab of the future.” But deciding what your next steps should be—and how to gain business value from your investment in artificial intelligence and other digitally advanced technologies—can be a challenge.

To help you navigate that challenge, I’ve compiled the five questions that my colleagues and I hear most frequently from leadership teams who are on their own digital transformation journeys. These questions, and the answers I propose below, may help you map your own path toward a high-value, purpose-driven lab of the future.

WHAT IS A LAB OF THE FUTURE?
In a lab of the future, operators see scientific data as a valuable business asset, and they harness digital lab technologies to contextualize that data and make it available at the lab bench, in the executive boardroom, and wherever it’s needed to drive smart decision-making.

That’s how I define the lab of the f ...