Douglas Pharmaceuticals, located in New Zealand, is a rapidly expanding pharmaceutical company with a reputation for high manufacturing standards, quality products and outstanding client service. The company researches, develops, manufactures, markets and distributes prescription and over-the-counter pharmaceutical, nutraceutical, and consumer healthcare products. Today Douglas Pharmaceuticals exports to 40 countries around the world.

Douglas’ targeted growth and expansion was predicted to have enormous impact on their laboratory operations. Information automation management was identified as a necessity for their regulated New Zealand Quality Control Department to support the corporate strategy.

A “Smart Labs” program was established, and based on capacity and utilization studies, the opportunity for over 20% efficiency gains was identified, including the introduction of a lean initiative, organizational structure review, and centralization of services. However these benefit opportunities could not be fully realized if not supported by automation and the implementation of a LIMS system.

The STARLIMS implementation was a catalyst for process improvement and optimization, capability enhancement, a shift from teams to shared services, elimination of noncore, non-value activities as part of the wider “Smart” laboratory journey. The journey continues as Douglas enhances and extends the use of STARLIMS to other laboratory sites in addition to applying the learnings from this implementation to other computerization and connectivity projects.