This week, we are pleased to welcome to the Data in Biotech podcast Brendan McCorkle, CEO of SciNote, a cloud-based ELN (Electronic Lab Notebook) with lab inventory, compliance, and team management tools.

In this episode, we discuss how the priorities of ‘Research’ and ‘Development’ differ when it comes to the data they expect and how they use it, and how ELNs can work to support both functions by balancing structure and flexibility. We explore the challenges of developing an ELN that serves the needs and workflows of all stakeholders, making the wider business case for ELNs, and why, in the lab, paper and Excel need to be a thing of the past.

Brendan is upfront about the data challenges faced by biotechs, which do not have one-vendor solutions. He emphasizes the importance of industry collaboration and software vendors’ role in following the principles of FAIR data. We also get his take on the future of ELNs and how they can leverage AI and ML.

Data in Biotech is a fortnightly podcast exploring how companies leverage data innovation in the life sciences.

Chapter Markers

[1:40 ] Brendan gives a whistlestop tour of his career and the path to setting up SciNote.

[4:20 ] Brendan discusses the principles of FAIR data and the challenges of adhering to them in the biotech industry.

[6:15 ] Brendan talks about the need to balance flexibility and structure when collecting R&D data.

[13:34 ] Brendan highlights the challenge of catering to diverse workflows, even within the same company.

[16:05 ] Brendan emphasizes the importance of metadata and how vendors, like SciNote, can help collect it with flexible tools for data entry and post-processing.

[18:59 ] Ross and Brendan discuss how to create an ELN that serves all stakeholders within the organization without imposing creativity constraints on research scientists.

[21:57 ] Brendan highlights how benefits like improving loss reduction and efficiency form part of the business case for a tool like SciNote.

[24:25 ] Brendan shares real-world examples of how companies integrate SciNote into their organizations and the need to work with other systems and software.

[34:01 ] Ross asks for his advice to biotech companies considering implementing ELNs, particularly into their workflows.

[39:10 ] Brendan gives his take on incorporating ML and AI within SciNote.

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