Tracking lab supply orders can often feel like being on a wild goose chase, filled with phone calls and emails to figure out if your order’s been approved, shipped, or if it's stuck somewhere in the process. This time-consuming back-and-forth wastes valuable hours that could be spent on high-priority research or strategic tasks. For lab managers, procurement professionals, and scientists, this issue is a significant productivity drain, and it's time to fix it.
The global lab supply market is booming, expected to reach $49.18 billion in 2025 and up to $81.24 billion in 2033. ZAGENO, the leading AI-powered lab supply marketplace, surveyed hundreds of research scientists, lab operations, and procurement professionals across biotech and pharmaceutical R&D labs about their purchasing processes. Among the results? A staggering number of hours are wasted on manual order tracking.
Wasting valuable time on lab supply order tracking: How much is it really costing your lab?
ZAGENO’s survey found that the average lab professional spends 6 hours per week just tracking lab supply orders. This manual process often involves emails and phone calls to suppliers, shipping departments, or even receiving docks. Here’s how the time breaks down across different roles:
- Procurement professionals: Spend an average of 22 hours per week tracking orders.
- Research scientists: Spend anywhere from 1.5 hours to 9 hours per week, depending on the stage of the organization.
As organizations scale, the time spent sourcing and tracking R&D products increases dramatically. In fact, scientists in large pharmaceutical companies spend up to 9 hours per week on order tracking, which is double the time spent by researchers in smaller biotechs. Even with procure-to-pay (P2P) systems in place, tracking time increases as operations grow, jumping from 2.4 hours per week in biotechs to 10 hours in large pharma companies, with scientists spending double the time tracking orders post-P2P implementation.
Scientist hours spent per week on order tracking, with and without P2P
Read the rest of ZAGENO survey results with the free eBook: 6 Key Lab Supply Purchasing Pains and Solutions
The hidden costs of manual order tracking: Inefficiency, delays, and frustration
For R&D labs, where hundreds of orders are placed every week, tracking becomes a nightmare without automation. As one scientist in ZAGENO’s survey shared:
“You have to check each item to see if it was dispatched since you don’t get a notification in the event of a delay. You think, ‘Oh, that should have arrived by now.’ But then you discover it is not even dispatched yet because there is suddenly a delay for four weeks. Then you need to cancel that one because you can’t wait that long, start looking for alternatives, and go back to the beginning of the cycle. With how often that happens, ordering is quite often a nightmare.”
The manual order tracking process includes several pain points that take valuable time away from research and production:
- Repeated calls and emails: Locating an order often requires multiple inquiries to suppliers, receiving docks, and internal departments.
- Lack of proactive notifications: Without alerts for backorders, delays, or shipping issues, teams are left in the dark until it’s too late.
- Non-centralized inventory and order tracking: Without a centralized system, scientists can’t access their order history, leading to confusion and delays.
- Fragmented receiving processes: Scientists must manually check if items have arrived, wasting additional time.
How to solve the lab supply tracking problem
While the life sciences industry has unique procurement needs, there’s no reason why lab supply ordering can’t be as easy as shopping on Amazon. ZAGENO’s self-service, AI-powered platform streamlines the entire process from order to receipt, offering over 40M products from 5,300 trusted brands. Here’s how ZAGENO’s automated features can help you save time and reduce frustrations:
Key features of ZAGENO’s lab supply marketplace that reduce order tracking time
- Self-service tracking: Easily track your orders, deliveries, and receipts all in one platform with a single log-in.
- Automated backorder notifications: Get proactive alerts about any delays or backorders to stay ahead of potential issues.
- Customizable notifications: Set up alerts for order confirmations, shipment updates, backorder statuses, and delivery tracking.
- Predictive Ship Date (PSD): Get an AI-powered estimated delivery timeline before an order even ships, which factors in supplier processing speed, warehouse location, and international shipping considerations.
- Streamlined approval flows: Simplify the approval process, speeding up order approvals and reducing delays.
- Comprehensive reporting and order history: Consolidate past and current orders for full visibility and better decision-making.
- Automated receiving: Easily align purchase orders, receiving reports, and supplier invoices with our automated 2-way match plus mobile receipt upload to guarantee accuracy.
With ZAGENO’s advanced features, labs can automate their procurement process and save valuable hours. Imagine scientists spending less time chasing down orders and more time conducting meaningful research and experiments.
The ZAGENO advantage: How It helps biotech and pharma labs scale efficiently
As labs grow, the complexity of managing supplies grows exponentially. ZAGENO's solution integrates easily into any organization’s existing workflow, offering a scalable solution to meet the demands of both small biotech startups and large pharmaceutical companies. By automating tedious manual tasks, ZAGENO helps labs focus on what matters most—innovation and discovery.
Start reducing order tracking time today
If you’re tired of wasting hours each week tracking down lab supply orders, it’s time to make a change. ZAGENO is the solution that makes order tracking simple, efficient, and proactive. Our AI-driven marketplace connects lab scientists and procurement professionals with suppliers, automating the entire ordering and tracking process.
Contact ZAGENO today to learn how our platform can help your team save time, reduce frustration, and streamline lab supply management.
