laboratory informatics
communication, scientific task management, and research content submission and review. Connect has been developed as a nimble and flexible platform that enables users to set up and run contracts, partnerships and collaborations rapidly, and disassemble them just as rapidly.’ Launched in January 2016, E-WorkBook
Connect effectively provides a cloud-based virtual research environment that doesn’t compromise the corporate infrastructure. Te working environment remains securely connected to the organisation’s internal informatics infrastructure, but offers a neutral space for organisations to invite external parties outside of their corporate firewalls to share, collaborate and work on live data. ‘E-WorkBook Connect also recognises scientific content, enabling parties to work together on, say, chemical structures, in real time. And at the end of a workflow or experiment, users will then be able securely to publish completed study data directly to E-WorkBook with a few clicks.’
Delays, inefficiencies and increased risks Externalisation, outsourcing and collaboration may be at the core of business and research models for a growing number of companies in the R&D sector but, across the biopharma value chain, information-driven decisions are being delayed because of a lack of clear and timely insight into experimental data across multiple locations, comments Anthony Uzzo, CEO at Core Informatics. ‘Seamless data collection, sharing, and analysis are vital for R&D innovation, but top-notch research is being hindered because R&D organisations are trying to manage information using complex combinations of Sharepoint sites, Dropbox folders, email, and mail and courier services,’ he notes, mirroring comments by Weiss. ‘Tis results in delays, inefficiencies, and increased risks from lost or unusable data. Te majority of life sciences organisations cannot easily create collaborative data-sharing environments with different access levels, applications, and security rules.’ Core Informatics has addressed these issues
by establishing Core Collaboration, a platform that provides immediately accessible, securely sequestered, virtual workspaces for global collaborators. ‘Core Collaboration supports synchronous data viewing and provides project dashboards that show only the information the viewer should see by leveraging granular permissions at the individual, team, and organisation levels. Te platform is designed for leaders in biopharma to derive greater value from externalisation strategies by
www.scientific-computing.com l
enabling deep and real-time collaborations, while ensuring privacy and security.’
Secure, walled data stores Core Collaboration was created to drive R&D efficiencies for clients who want to reduce complexity while ensuring the highest standard of security, data and experimental protocols are maintained, Uzzo explains. ‘Te workspaces are effectively walled data stores, within the same database, and so ensure that only the external partner assigned to the workspace and the owner of the system can access the data. Te information is shared securely and seamlessly. Approved collaborators can use pre-configured Core
SECURITY ISSUES DO STILL REPRESENT A MAJOR HURDLE TO THE ESTABLISHMENT OF TRUE OPEN INNOVATION PARTNERSHIPS
products – Core LIMS, ELN, and SDMS (scientific data management system) – and applications to achieve the owner’s objectives. When a workspace is decommissioned, the data remains intact in the database and the external partner’s access rights are withdrawn.’ Yet security issues do still represent a major
hurdle to the establishment of true open innovation partnerships, suggests Andrew Anderson, VP of business development at ACD/Labs. Te Toronto-based firm’s flagship cheminformatics platform, ACD/Spectrus, specifically allows scientists to collect, analyse and interpret chemical, structural and analytical data in a real-time environment. ‘Te R&D sector is willing, in theory, to embrace a wider, more flexible ecosystem of
Data Lake
partners across the development life cycle, from early research through to contract manufacturing. However, setting up such open environments represents a significant headache with respect to cross party data handling and transfer.’
Partnership relationship management system In essence, confidentiality and IP issues are the same, whether you have one or multiple partners working on the same project, but the complexity of dealing with those issues is increased the more partners and the more diverse your collaborative environment, Anderson states, concurring with Weiss. Key to any short- or long-term collaboration or contract research agreement is a partnership relationship management system that will help to oversee both the quantitative and qualitative exchange of information. Anderson maintains that three important considerations will ensure impactful collaborations, while maintaining security. Te first is collaborative governance. ‘Any system that establishes either long-term or transient connections within partnership networks must manage the frameworks for how collaborations are contractually defined’, he stresses. Specifically, method, frequency, and format of correspondence should be designed within the system.’
Permission management Te second consideration is permission management. Te system must manage roles and responsibilities for all stakeholders within a collaboration. ‘Moreover, the system must also offer sufficient granularity programmatically to facilitate the successful management of such roles and responsibilities.’ From a security perspective, this is the most critical element, Anderson comments. ‘For
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Data Warehouse (ACD/Spectrus) Management of Secure Data Exchange using the ACD/Spectrus Platform @scwmagazine FEBRUARY/MARCH 2016 13
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