LIMS: How to Strategically Justify the System Acquisition

So, you’ve decided your organization truly needs a LIMS and convinced your department head that this is the case. However, to move forward, you need to secure funding for the LIMS, and your management has asked you to justify the purchase — but where do you start?

The justification for purchasing a LIMS system is generally derived from two main categories of measures: Tangible and Intangible. Tangible measures are the clearest to determine — they provide direct monetary justification and measurable Return on Investment (ROI) values, which is the return on a given investment made and accounted for in months, in order to pay back the invested amount. Intangible measures make up a good part of the most important benefits of implementing an automation and information system, but measuring their financial impact is complex.

Tangible justifications for adopting a LIMS

These are derived from time savings (i.e., efficiency gains) and, consequently, cost savings that can be achieved through the implementation and use of a LIMS. When documenting these factors, look for bottlenecks and repetitive tasks in your laboratory workflow that can be alleviated through LIMS automation. Some of the classic areas to analyze include:

· Reduction of time spent on manual tasks such as data transcription, result calculation, document generation, as well as other activities that can be eliminated or reduced through automation and information systems;
· Cost reduction through better utilization of material resources such as testing consumables, equipment, etc.;
· Increased laboratory production capacity with the same team through better utilization of human resources, reducing costs and time wasted on activities that do not add value to the process, and focusing them on more specialized tasks;
· Reduction of costs or losses caused by delays in releasing results, or errors in results.

After determining the time required to perform the tasks, you should estimate the time to perform the same task once the LIMS is implemented. Subtracting the two will give you the actual time savings, which should be extrapolated over a full year. Calculate the annual time savings and multiply it by the costs (i.e., salary and benefits) of whoever performs the tasks, and you will get the annual cost savings of having a LIMS in your operation.

Intangible justifications for adopting a LIMS

Developing your justifications in the intangible category is often more difficult. Even though a value cannot be assigned to these items, they are still valuable and often end up being the deciding factors in getting your project approved. Some key examples of intangible justifications include:

Greater information availability;
Greater innovation;
Greater collaboration;
Reduction of manual errors;
Greater agility in customer service;
Fewer quality deviations;
Greater organization;
Less bureaucracy;
Better environmental management;
Greater clarity in decision-making.

Investment in automation and information systems is one of the best ways to optimize laboratory processes, delivering significant increases in productivity and result quality, as well as cost reduction.

So, if you’d like to analyze the ROI of a LIMS project for your laboratory, Actiz can support you with this task and show you the benefits of adopting Actiz LIMS at your company. Contact us and schedule a free demo!