Inventiva

Leading French biotech uses IDBS’ ActivityBase to optimize HTS and HCS. Inventiva has seen a tenfold decrease in the time it takes to complete analysis work.

A spin-off of Abbott, Inventiva is a French biotech company specializing in running and managing integrated drug discovery partnerships from target validation up to clinical candidate selection. In response to today’s increasingly competitive marketplace, the company was looking for a solution to replace its outdated technology and improve lab processes.

Key points:

Researchers were struggling to run screening and analysis speedily, hindered by antiquated technology
Using ActivityBase, Inventiva can now easily run and analyze assays on one efficient platform meeting all their HTS and HCS needs
ActivityBase has ensured a ten-fold decrease in the time it takes to run analysis

The challenge

In response to today’s increasingly competitive marketplace, Inventiva was looking for a solution to replace its outdated technology and improve lab processes.

Inventiva was keen to encourage faster and better quality results on both the high throughput screening (HTS) and high content screening (HCS) sides of the lab. Legacy technology meant that speed was a big issue, as was the way data was displayed.

Researchers were struggling to run screening and analysis speedily, hindered by antiquated technology that had not been updated for a very long time. The way in which data was presented also made it very difficult to analyze wells efficiently and get the best out of assays.

Philippe Masson at Inventiva said, “We are a growing company with big ambitions and we pride ourselves on the quality of our work. We knew we needed to invest to help improve our data analysis process with the ultimate goal of boosting the speed with which we can analyze data and the ways in which we can view the results.”

The solution

Inventiva undertook a rigorous selection process of vendors in the market. IDBS’ ActivityBase was chosen, offering all the capabilities that suited the lab’s needs and importantly, delivering a competitive price point.

Xavier Espanel said, “When we saw the ActivityBase solution and its capabilities, we knew it was the option for us. We undertook a very comprehensive review of the solutions out there, but were particularly impressed by the HCS functionalities in ActivityBase.”

ActivityBase enables Inventiva’s researchers to display high content screening images speedily in-line with the analysis data, something it couldn’t do previously. This approach represents a new avenue for Inventiva in terms of how the firm views assay data and was a big draw of the solution. It is also integrated seamlessly with other lab equipment and systems to ensure reporting is smooth and based on high-quality data.

IDBS has worked closely with Inventiva to rollout ActivityBase across HTS and HSC in France in a truly collaborative way. The platform was up and running in less than a year and IDBS’ agile development approach during the project enabled the incorporation of Inventiva’s needs quickly and effectively.

Sebastien Jacquet said, “As well as a strong system, we’ve been thrilled to have such a collaborative approach to working with IDBS. There’s been a lot of people on both sides willing this to be a success and it hasn’t disappointed. The support we got from the IDBS technical support and developers in the UK was a big help. Integration was run efficiently without incident. They took into account our needs and we were able to participate too so that we could be a direct part of this transformation.”

The results

Using ActivityBase, Inventiva can now easily run and analyze assays on one efficient platform meeting all their HTS and HCS needs. After implementation, a significant improvement in the data analysis process has seen the company realize a huge tenfold decrease in the time it takes to complete this analysis work.

As well as the significant saving made on analysis time, Inventiva has also seen an increase in the quality of its data through the correct enforcement of the company’s requirements and standards during analysis.

“The feedback from our researchers is very good and we are thrilled with the significant time savings we have made in terms of running analyses,” said Philippe Masson. “ActivityBase streamlines our data capture and speeds up our analysis, making the whole process easier and smoother. It’s particularly great to have a more graphic visualization of our data in graph/curve form. Our change in technology has also afforded us an uptick in data quality.”

This success has led to plans to extend the footprint beyond the original project scope.