A) Client: A leading biotech/Sciences company-Protocol Management System

Executive Summary

The client, a startup company, is creating a multi layer protocol and scientific knowledge database, entering protocols into the database, assigning a protocol ID number for each entered protocol, rating and ranking protocols in the database, versioning of protocols and providing different layers of access into the database.

The company's goal is to help customers reduce the time, cost and risk of drug development, as well as optimize the post–approval marketing and use of pharmaceutical products.

The client’s technology is the foundation for its easy to use Enterprise Collaboration System for the drug development process. The software addresses the growing need of research and development professionals to make complex decisions, as well as organize and share complex data across disparate platforms and sources. Cutting–edge Internet technology makes the applications easy to use and to access from any device.

The client Enterprise Collaboration system core products are myMetabook – to organize your notebook records and protocols; myCollaborations – to manage your group research projects; and the Library – to collaborate, publish and find cutting edge research methods submitted by scientists all over the world.

We built the entire initial application framework the client. The development was undertaken in three phases spread over a four-month period.

Business Challenge

The client started the implementation of the knowledge database with a technology that was not suitable for the kind of application that they wanted to have. Also the initial system that was designed could not scale linearly to the traffic expectations of the website. Being a startup company with very little seed funding, the company could not afford a solution that could meet to their expectations but one which is expensive.

The client approached us through known references to consult for a better solution. The technical staff that consulted with the client executives provided them with various technology alternatives and especially low-cost.

Also, initially the client’s team was not well versed with the design strategies for the creation of the requirements/ needs documents. Our personnel also provided them with process information to create the requirement documents.

Exploring Solutions

Though there were many solutions to the problems that the client was facing, the driving factor was the cost of the solution. After analyzing various alternatives, we suggested to the client an architecture that included components that were practical available free of cost, thus reducing the cost of development and implementation of the website.

Implementing and using the System

The goal is to initially create a skeleton of the system, fill each area with a few functions, and add to them from there. We were involved in developing Input of protocols, registration of users, site-wide search functionality, and a protocol library. In the Linux, BSD Unix- Apache, JSP, HTML and Server side Java, MySQL environment.

Optimizing Technology Resources

The development of the client’s website was based on very stringent deadlines. Especially taking into account that the basic needs were not well formulated, our personnel had to spend a lot of time interacting with the client to generate the Needs Analysis document. The technology architecting phase was also a major time consuming phase. Overall, the software design, development and testing phases had to be tightly scheduled to allow us to deliver the application on time.

The other major factor was the actual cost of development. The application involved a variety of technologies in the deployment environments and the development environments. Though there was no scope in reduction of cost in the deployment environment, there was opportunity to cut costs in the development effort provided it was well planned. Our managers made a careful assessment of the manpower required by analyzing the technical skill set of each of the development staff to get the right mix of technical expertise. This gave us a significant reduction in cost enabling it to give Metazoa.com a competitive price bid.

Bottom Line Advantage

The client had a lot of direct benefit in terms of time and money by utilizing our resources for the development of the application. The company had a head start in the entry into the web based collaboration space of the health sciences sector. Being a pioneer in this field, the client was successful over the competition by launching the application in a very short span of time.

Today, the client is part of a larger Corporation that develops and markets integrated products and services that enable pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies to achieve significant and enduring improvements in the development and use of therapeutic products.