The day I found a seriously hazardous chemical sitting casually on a lab shelf was the day I realized we’d outgrown our start-up processes. No one knew who bought it, why it was there, or what experiments required such a dangerous chemical. This moment crystallized a truth I’d been wrestling with for months: successful biotech scaling isn’t about choosing between big pharma structure and start-up agility it’s about masterfully blending both.
My journey began in scientific academia before working at multiple biotech’s from start-up to BioPharma, including two stints in Global Pharma through acquisition. I’ve learned that growth without the right systems leads to chaos but too much structure kills the innovation that makes biotech extraordinary.
When I transitioned from Big Pharma to a 20-person start-up, I thought I was prepared. What I discovered was an academic lab that had simply “spilled out the door” into a commercial building, brilliant scientists doing what they do best, but with limited core processes and minimal health and safety protocols.
The statistics tell the story: research shows that only 25% of biotech companies successfully navigate the transition from start-up to scale-up. The primary culprit? Failing to implement scalable systems before they’re desperately needed. Here’s how I learned to bridge that gap, and the lessons that can help you build a company that scales without losing its innovative soul.
The biggest challenge in scaling biotech operations is maintaining visibility as you grow while empowering your teams to move fast. When I managed five labs and 20 people, I could literally see everything happening. I was the go-to person with a fantastic span of control. At 200 people and over 40 labs with a facilities team of 11, this approach became impossible and counterproductive.
Another challenge is the influx of new colleagues. In a growing organization with highly motivated new people keen to get things done, if you don’t have the structure in place, you could end up with serious problems.
The breakthrough came when I realized that I needed empowered control within a well-defined system. We established lab champions – scientists who took ownership of their spaces and became communication bridges between lab work and facilities management. They were empowered team members who understood both the science and the operational needs.
Our Framework: We created systems, frequently using software as tools, that provided real-time visibility and management oversight while still enabling scientists to work flexibly and independently within the systems, escalating only exceptions that required human judgment. This gave scientists more autonomy and freedom to operate while ensuring appropriate control measures and risk management remained in place operationally.
We also shifted from trying to manage individual scientists to managing lab functions. Instead of tracking what each person was ordering, we focused on functional areas; molecular biology, cell culture, analytical chemistry each with its own processes and requirements. This approach respected the expertise of our teams while ensuring consistency and compliance across the organization.
The key insight? Empowerment without systems leads to chaos, but systems without empowerment lead to stagnation. The sweet spot is building infrastructure that amplifies your team’s capabilities rather than constraining them.
R&D procurement is unlike any other business function; you can’t easily centralize the operation because historical demand isn’t an indicator of future requirements. While it’s possible for LabOps to manage repeating procurement needs, 70% of items ordered are only ever ordered once. Only the scientific team knows what they plan to do next, requiring a layer of delegation and trust.
The solution wasn’t more bureaucracy it was smarter systems. We implemented automated workflows that embedded intelligence directly into the procurement process.
Instead of relying on human gatekeepers who created bottlenecks, we built decision-making criteria directly into the software system. Scientists could still move fast on routine purchases, but dangerous or expensive items automatically triggered the right approval processes. This approach reduced unnecessary exposure of staff to hazardous substances while actually decreasing approval times.
We also tackled the fragmentation challenge head-on. Previously, scientists could go directly to suppliers and negotiate individually without appropriate training on how to do so effectively. We had high-value equipment purchases routed through proper channels with facility requirements built into the approval workflow.
By centralizing procurement while maintaining scientific choice, we achieved group buying power and simplified vendor management without constraining research flexibility.
The procurement transformation taught me a crucial lesson: you can have both speed and control, but only if you’re smart about where you apply each. Routine decisions should be automated; complex decisions should be streamlined, not eliminated. Training, culture, and process clarity are key to success.
Inventory management might not seem glamorous, but it’s where operational efficiency lives or dies. When you’re small, running out of tips or reagents is an annoyance. When you’re larger, it can shut down multiple projects and cost hundreds of thousands in delays.
Our inventory challenges were classic scaling problems. We’d over-order PBS (ending up with pallets of the stuff), run out of critical consumables because someone cleaned out the stockroom for their big experiment, or store temperature-sensitive materials incorrectly because we didn’t have proper receiving protocols.
We implemented a three-tiered approach to inventory management:
For our more complex labs, particularly our development facilities, we created specialized storage areas. Scientists could access pre-packaged supplies without breaking containment protocols, and our teams could restock efficiently without disrupting ongoing work.
The real breakthrough came when we started treating inventory as a service rather than a storage problem. Our goal wasn’t just to have supplies available it was to ensure scientists never had to think about supplies at all. When inventory management works perfectly, it becomes invisible.
Equipment management is where biotech operations get truly complex. With 10-30 pieces of equipment per scientist, tracking everything from pipettes to mass spectrometers becomes a logistical nightmare without proper systems.
Our equipment challenges were multifaceted. Equipment might get ordered without considering facility requirements – we would often encounter capital equipment arriving with no prior knowledge, no space capacity, or facilities in place to support it. Some equipment required detailed knowledge of building structure if it was heavy, produced vibrations, or presented installation challenges. It’s common to take out a door, wall, or window to site equipment! Without a system, there was a lack of visibility into what we owned, where it was, or when it needed servicing.
I’ve always tried to implement systems early to avoid issues. Examples included centralized equipment approval workflows that captured not just the purchase decision, but all the supporting infrastructure requirements. Does this equipment need three-phase power? Special ventilation? Vibration isolation? These questions were built into the approval process upfront to prevent surprises.
For service contracts, we took a page from big pharma and consolidated everything possible. Instead of managing hundreds of individual contracts with random expiration dates, we negotiated consolidated agreements by manufacturer. This approach reduced costs and management time.
The Visibility Solution: We implemented a comprehensive asset management software system that tracked not just what we owned, but its condition, location, maintenance history, and associated service contracts.
The equipment management transformation taught me that successful scaling requires thinking in systems, not individual transactions. Every piece of equipment exists within a web of relationships; power, space, service, training, consumables. Managing these relationships proactively rather than reactively is the difference between smooth operations and constant crisis management.
Nothing tests your scaling philosophy like health and safety. In academic labs and early-stage biotech’s, safety often takes a backseat to discovery. But as you grow, this approach becomes both legally and operationally untenable.
The biggest insight I gained from Big Pharma was that safety shouldn’t be the department that says “no”- it should be the team that figures out how to say “yes, safely.” This required a fundamental shift in how we positioned safety within the organization.
Instead of implementing heavy-handed approval processes that killed innovation speed, we built safety intelligence directly into our procurement and project workflows. When someone tried to order a hazardous chemical without a risk assessment, the system didn’t just block them—it guided them through the assessment process and connected them with safety resources.
We standardized risk assessments for common procedures and chemicals, created streamlined approval workflows for new hazards, and most importantly, shifted responsibility back to the scientists actually doing the work. Instead of having safety professionals write risk assessments for experiments they didn’t understand, we empowered scientists to assess their own risks using standardized frameworks and expert review.
The transformation from reactive to proactive safety culture took time and persistent effort. We introduced mandatory safety training, implemented comprehensive incident reporting systems, and created clear consequences for non-compliance. Most importantly, we demonstrated through leadership behavior that safety was a core value, not a compliance checkbox.
Results That Matter: The proof came not just in increased near-miss reporting and reduced incidents, but in changed behavior. Scientists started self-policing and looking out for each other. Safety specs became standard rather than something people tried to avoid. Most tellingly, when we had our external audit, we achieved the highest safety rating on our science park.
The health and safety journey taught me that culture change is possible, but it requires consistent leadership, smart systems, and the patience to change minds as well as behaviors. Safety done right doesn’t slow innovation – it enables sustainable innovation by protecting the people who make it possible.
Throughout this journey, one of the most transformative partnerships came through implementing an integrated LabOps platform. While I’d built many processes manually over the years, having the right technology backbone made our vision of intelligent, automated workflows actually achievable.
The right platform solved several critical challenges simultaneously. Automated hazard flagging that had taken us months to build manually became native to the system, immediately identifying dangerous chemicals and routing them through appropriate safety protocols. Consolidation capabilities that had required complex spreadsheets and manual tracking became seamless, giving us real-time visibility into our entire spend across multiple locations and departments.
What impressed me most was how the right technology enabled the empowerment-with-control balance I’d been working toward throughout my career. Scientists maintained the autonomy to order what they needed for their research, but intelligent guardrails ensured compliance and cost optimization happened automatically. The system could handle routine decisions while escalating exceptions that required human judgment.
For equipment management, service contract consolidation capabilities finally gave us the vendor leverage I’d seen work so effectively in big pharma, but with the agility our growing biotech needed. Instead of managing dozens of individual contracts, we could negotiate consolidated agreements and track everything in one place.
The platform became the operational foundation that let us scale to 200 people without losing our innovative edge – proving that the right technology doesn’t constrain growth, it enables it.
Today’s successful biotech’s understand that structure and agility aren’t opposing forces they’re complementary capabilities that, when properly balanced, create sustainable competitive advantage. The companies that master this balance build systems that enable speed rather than constrain it, processes that accelerate rather than delay innovation.
Whether you’re at 50 people looking toward 100, or 200 people preparing for commercial launch, remember this fundamental truth: successful scaling isn’t about choosing between structure and agility. It’s about building intelligent systems that amplify your team’s innovation potential while protecting what matters most; your people, your science, and your mission.
The future belongs to biotech organizations that are both disciplined and nimble, both systematic and innovative. In a sector where the next breakthrough could change millions of lives, we have an obligation to build companies that can scale their impact without losing the innovative spirit that makes biotech extraordinary.
Your journey from start-up to scaled success doesn’t have to sacrifice the qualities that make your company special. With the right balance of structure and agility, you can build something remarkable: an organization that grows without growing rigid, scales without slowing down, and transforms scientific potential into therapeutic reality that changes lives.
Scaling a biotech company is no small feat, and having the right tools and partners can make all the difference. As my journey demonstrates, the right systems don’t just support growth, they enable it. MyAmici’s integrated procurement and inventory management platform is designed specifically for the unique challenges of biotech organizations, addressing every pain point I’ve described above.
Whether you’re setting up a new lab, managing rapid growth, or navigating the complexities of GMP operations, MyAmici provides the expertise and technology to keep your teams focused on what matters most – science.
MyAmici’s solutions empower biotech companies to scale smarter, faster, and with confidence, maintaining that crucial balance between structure and agility that makes the difference between successful scaling and stagnation.
Discover how MyAmici can help your organization navigate the same challenges I faced while scaling without losing your innovative edge. Visit MyAmici to learn more and take the first step toward operational excellence that enables breakthrough science.
Your journey from start-up to scaled success doesn’t have to sacrifice what makes your company special – with the right partner, you can build something remarkable.
Get in touch with MyAmici today to explore how we can streamline your procurement and Lab Operations.