Focus on the New Lab Supply Vendor Set-up Process
With today’s technology, the supplier addition process for R&D shouldn’t completely drain the energy of all involved, but it does. In a recent ZAGENO study of scientists, lab operations, and procurement professionals in the life sciences industry, 61% of respondents reported experiencing experiment delays due to waiting for a new supplier to be added to their accounting system and/or procure-to-pay (P2P) platform.
To “add” a new supplier means that a scientist wishes to order from a vendor that is completely new to the organization or, in some cases, is a non-preferred vendor. This process includes due diligence and approval by finance, account set-up, addition to the accounting system and/or P2P platform, and onboarding. Usually, all of this must be complete before scientists can place an order.
So, how much time do scientists actually spend waiting for new suppliers to get set up?
- 51% wait for a week or less
- Nearly 30% wait 2-3 weeks
- 20% wait more than a month
During this window, the necessary item(s) might go on backorder, become unavailable, or go up in price, forcing the scientist to start the process all over again.
“New vendors should not take six weeks to add. It should be next day if it is even necessary at all.”
— Lab director, major pharmaceutical company
This trend is only intensifying. In 2021, biopharma R&D teams added up to 50% new suppliers to help support innovation and address product availability.
Surprisingly, survey respondents at firms with P2P platforms reported longer wait times to add suppliers than those without. Does this mean that labs should not implement P2P? Absolutely not. The benefits of a digital procurement strategy that includes P2P far outweighs the drawbacks, but there is a way for any size or staged organization to balance vendor consolidation with scientific choice – all while speeding up the supplier addition process.
Reduce supplier-related experiment delays with a self-service, digital marketplace. Use of a private, e-marketplace such as ZAGENO enables scientists to build carts from over 30m+ product SKUs across over 5,000 suppliers. When customers wish to order from a new supplier, ZAGENO manages the addition process. The same process that might have taken weeks is reduced to days. Additionally, ZAGENO offers streamlined invoicing with one invoice for all lab supplies each month, with ZAGENO as vendor of record.
