CTEC North America 2023 Agenda
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Sunday, April 23
1:00 PM – 5:00 PM | Registration Open
6:30 PM – 8:00 PM | Registration Open
6:30 PM – 8:00 PM | Welcome Reception
Meet LabVantage staff and other attendees. Delicious assortment of desserts, hor d’oeuvres and drinks will be served.
Monday, April 24
7:00 AM – 5:30 PM | Registration Open
7:30 AM – 8:45 AM | Breakfast
8:45 AM – 9:00 AM | Welcome and Opening Remarks
Jeff Vannest, LabVantage Product Management
9:00 AM – 9:30 AM | Discovery to Decision: How Your Data Plays in the Lab of the Future
Mikael Hagstroem, CEO of LabVantage and Executive Chairman of TCG Digital
Where are you, on your journey to the lab of the future? Are you struggling to get data out of your scientific data lake? Are you only looking at use case cases when it comes to AI and persistent analytics? Let us share the journey we have taken with some customers in our quest toward the lab of the future, and how we can help you, too.
9:30 AM – 10:00 AM | Insights on semantics within the digital agenda
Klaus Heumann, LabVantage Biomax
With a focus on accelerating innovation with maximal efficiency, Biomax AILANI semantic search is a central pillar for the dissemination of knowledge throughout digital organizations, unlocking hidden knowledge and making data accessible.
10:00 AM – 10:30 AM | Digital transformation of the laboratory with analytics and AI
Debdas Sen, TCG Digital
In this session, we will explain how LabVantage clients are leveraging LabVantage Analytics and AI to transform the laboratory from analysis and monitoring to control, optimization, and automation. We will explore a wide range of use cases including laboratory performance, chemical data management, risk management, production process analysis, and scientific development.
10:30 AM – 11:00 AM | Break
11:00 AM – 12:00 PM | LabVantage Product Roadmap & Strategic Focus Areas
Matt Grulke, VP of R&D; Jeff Vannest, Product Management, LabVantage
LabVantage Product Management and R&D departments monitor the laboratory informatics space, listen to customers, employees, and even regulatory agencies and social media, in order to anticipate the future demands of laboratories globally, in order to build compelling and effective solutions. This presentation will provide an overview of the areas we’re exploring, new products that we’re considering, and the strategic focus areas we’re prioritizing.
12:00 PM – 1:00 PM | Lunch
1:00 PM – 1:30 PM | Biobanking & Growth – Challenges for achieving scalability
Josh Spencer, Sr. System Manager, Mayo Clinic
Since the introduction of LabVantage 8 in 2017, the Mayo Clinic has experienced a rapid increase in growth within the biorepository program. This growth has created cost and quality challenges with sample intake. Mayo has undertaken a number of projects to create sample intake mechanisms to scale with increased demand while reducing cost and quality issues. This presentation will discuss the approaches taken, lessons learned, and challenges as we continue to expand our business.
1:30 PM – 2:30 PM | Strategy in Action: What’s coming in LabVantage 8.9
Mark Hill & Gary Stimson, LabVantage R&D
Get a sneak peek at some of the new functionality coming in LabVantage 8.9, which will be released in early 2024. We’ll provide a review of the improvements we’re making to the Stability module, ELN, data retention, dashboards for Portal, and some of the customer-requested enhancements we’ve received through Vantage Care.
2:30 PM – 3:00 PM | Novavax’s Global Quality Control Digital Transformation: Harnessing the Power of LIMS Implementation Blueprints
Yinka Oladiran, Senior IT Business Analyst, Lab Operations, Novavax & Ed Peloquin, Director, Laboratory Informatics Delivery Services, Astrix
This presentation will discuss how a modified agile approach can be implemented to successfully deploy a global LIMS to a Quality Control (QC) department. We will focus on how an agile methodology can be tailored to the specific needs of the deployment. Additionally, we’ll detail the different teams and stages of the deployment process while discussing the key challenges that must be addressed to ensure a successful deployment. Finally, the presentation will provide recommendations for future deployments.
3:00 PM – 3:30 PM | Break
3:30 PM – 4:00 PM | Scaling an Enterprise Global LIMS System
Steven Bartingale, Knowledge Management Leader, 3M
3M has successfully customized and deployed the enterprise LabVantage LIMS system across its major global analytical labs. A request-centric workflow, custom security logic, and modifications to arrays were critical requirements for the live groups. Additional R&D labs are now adopting the platform to drive productivity and efficiency for their business units and require new capabilities in the LIMS system. In this presentation, we will describe the strategy used to scale the deployment without disruption to the live sites and with minimal added customization.
4:00 PM – 4:30 PM | Using LabVantage as the System Hub in a Data-Tracking Pipeline for Immunology Research
Kaitlyn Phelan, Senior Application Analyst, Penn Medicine
LabVantage was utilized as the biospecimen tracking system for the Immune Health project during the COVID-19 pandemic and has since been expanded to become the hub in a data-tracking pipeline for The Institute for Immunology and Immune Health (I3H) at Penn Medicine. This expansion has consisted of additional workflows, interfaces, and integrations between LabVantage and a mobile application, a billing invoice system, and a metadata management and analytical platform. This talk will focus on how we were able to implement the infrastructure needed to span the clinical research, lab operations, and billing administrator groups at Penn Medicine using the configurable tools available within the LabVantage system.
Start Parallel Discussion Groups
4:30 PM – 5:30 PM | Discussion Group 1: Feedback on LabVantage 8.9
Mark Hill & Gary Stimpson, LabVantage R&D
As a follow-up to our earlier “What’s coming in LabVantage 8.9” presentation, please join us to give feedback and brainstorm on the features and changes that are planned as part of our LabVantage 8.9 release.
4:30 PM – 5:30 PM | Discussion Group 2: Instrument Connectivity, SDMS, and more
Arjan Flierman & Lari Tuononen, LabVantage R&D
Where did we come from with our Instrument Integration and Data Storage? Where are we today, with LIMS CI, LV Connect, and SDMS? Where do we want to be in the future, combining all of the above, including scientific data lakes?
4:30 PM – 5:30 PM | Discussion Group 3: DevSecOps Focus for 2023
Ed Anderson, LabVantage R&D
The LabVantage DevSecOps Team is continuing to improve the Handsfree tools. This year, we are moving past the now completed installation, upgrade, and patching scenarios. In this discussion, we will present our plans for SSO, Remote CMT, and making Handsfree capable of doing all LV Console work.
We’d also like to do some requirements gathering and analysis. How is 8.8 Handsfree working for you? How would you improve it? What are you doing still remote desk-topped into your LV VMs or on the LV Console? How can we make LV development, testing, installation, configuration, or maintenance faster?
4:30 PM – 5:30 PM | Discussion Group 4: Labs without Borders – Science in the Metaverse
Don Rainville, Digital Lab Innovation Director, Accenture
The Metaverse is real, but it’s fake, but it’s… real? It turns out we can do a lot of really useful things in the Metaverse that help our lab work get better, faster, and cheaper. Let’s explore use cases we’ve dreamed up and built, and imagine others that can unleash scientific ingenuity.
End Parallel Discussion Groups
5:30 PM – 11:00 PM | Dinner on Your Own
Monday night is dinner on your own. However, there are some fantastic restaurants in the area! Be sure to visit us at the registration desk or check out the CTEC mobile app for suggestions.
6:00 PM – 10:00 PM | Free Shuttle to Lower Broadway
Need a ride? LabVantage provides a free and looping shuttle service from the Loews Vanderbilt Hotel to Lower Broadway in Nashville and back to the hotel. Pick-up from the Loews hotel is at the top of the hour and returns from the Assembly Hall at the half hour. The last bus leaves the hotel at 9:00 PM, and the last bus leaves the Assembly Hall on Lower Broadway at 9:30 PM. Seats are first come first serve. If the shuttle is full or you need a ride outside the shuttle time, ride-share options are available.
Tuesday, April 25
7:30 AM – 5:00 PM | Registration Open
7:30 AM – 9:00 AM | Breakfast
9:00 AM – 9:30 AM | Let’s Imagine a Vastly Different Future for Laboratory Scientists
Adam Borenstein, Managing Director, Accenture
For the past 30 years, scientific laboratories have barely kept pace with other business technologies and data capabilities. Now, thanks to the exponential advancements of technology at work and at home, the next generation of scientists have wildly different expectations compared to what current lab environments offer. Closing that gap is no longer optional – it is critical for organizations whose innovation and quality depend on scientific talent. Let’s explore where digital labs are heading and how laboratory science is already starting to look much different.
9:30 AM – 10:00 AM | Supporting the Unique Needs of the Penn Medicine Central BioBank
Ned Haubein, Sr. Application Manager, Penn Medicine
The Penn Medicine BioBank (PMBB) is the central biobank at Penn Medicine and collects samples prospectively to support research across the institution. This talk will discuss the unique needs of PMBB, the unique path traveled to engage with this team, and how the Penn Medicine LIMS team implemented the system for them. We will also look to the future and how we plan to leverage LabVantage to meet their evolving needs around billing, possible off-site sample storage, and further integration with clinical meta-data.
10:00 AM – 10:30 AM | Improving Laboratories through Enhanced LabVantage Services
Craig Bowie, LabVantage Professional Services
As we continue our commitment to improved delivery, LabVantage is adding many new services that can accelerate your operations. This presentation will introduce our new Services Factory, Master Data Management practice, and how we’re optimizing Professional Services through improved processes and globalized management.
10:30 AM – 11:00 AM | Break
11:00 AM – 11:30 AM | Evolve series – Global Enhancement Process
Hasmik Mkrtchyan, Global Business Process Manager, Catalent
We spoke last year about digital transformation, tactically meeting its demands via a multitude of tools and embracing it not only as a change but as an opportunity to evolve. This year, as companies from various industries move toward greater automation, a robust enhancement process becomes a critical component of any system’s life cycle. End user requests can range from system configuration, to reports, to SOPs, and across multiple systems. And everyone wants it delivered yesterday! To support the business needs, a global or local enhancement process must be flexible, adaptable, and scalable, while being attainable regardless of company size and financial constraints. In this second session of the Evolve series, we will cover the key criteria of a successful enhancement process and its advantages.
11:30 AM – 12:00 PM | Panel Discussion: Digital Transformation strategies
Hasmik Mkrtchyan, Global Business Process Manager, Catalent
Join us for a discussion about digital transformation strategies and ask questions to an expert panel consisting of Catalent and LabVantage leaders.
12:00 PM – 1:00 PM | Lunch
1:00 PM – 1:30 PM | LabVantage SDMS at Illumina
Kevin Detweiler, Staff Software Systems Engineer, Illumina
Illumina implemented the LabVantage SDMS in our production environment at the end of 2022. This presentation will detail our experience with SDMS implementation and post-go-live performance, highlight our SDMS instrument configurations, as well as discuss challenges encountered and how they were overcome. It will highlight how the team designed SDMS drivers for reuse by defining the mapping for the import file(s) in the Parameter List master data. The automatic creation and loading of an array plate using the SDMS will be discussed. Finally, this presentation will detail how we integrated features into the LES worksheet to automatically display SDMS Data Capture attachments and provide visibility into the error logs when an import fails.
Breakout Track 1
1:30 PM – 2:30 PM | Tips and Tricks for Daily LabVantage Usage
Rob Paul, LabVantage Technical Sales
Think you’re a LabVantage power user? Join us for a presentation about some of the lesser-known features in LabVantage that can help make your work quicker and more efficient.
2:30 PM – 3:30 PM | LabVantage 8.8: Less PowerPoint, More Demo!
Rob Paul, Fred Hoffmann & Stephanie Ratliff, LabVantage Technical Sales
Tired of PowerPoints? Watch the LabVantage Technical Sales Team build LabVantage 8.8 features on the fly and before your very eyes! Even better, grab a microphone and challenge them to build something even more interesting. We’re looking forward to the challenge!
Breakout Track 2
1:30 PM – 2:00 PM | Lab Admins, a story of guardrails, training wheels, and apron strings: Building a sustainable training program to support the expanding footprint in a global enterprise LIMS
Lila Peacock, Enterprise Product Manager, Bayer – Crop Science
As the number of labs increases in our global enterprise LabVantage system, the need for formal engagement, training, community networking, and new lab administrators has driven a need to support both face-to-face and online training. These encourage sustainable lab processes, growth, and continual improvement. This presentation will cover who we select for the lab admin role, the benefits they bring, the training they require, and the expectations they bring to the role.
2:00 PM – 2:30 PM | Containerization in the Field and in the Future LIMS
Lari Tuononen, LabVantage R&D
LabVantage is moving toward containerization, which is a way to deploy software in a manner that is portable, scalable, fault-tolerant, and agile. This technical discussion will present an introduction to the container framework we’re working with, including Docker, Kubernetes, OpenShift, and more. We’ll review the benefits of using containers and LabVantage’s longer-term plans for this strategy.
2:30 PM – 3:00 PM | How to make your Workflows and DFDs Groovy
Nicholas Felts, Sr. Consultant, Moffitt Cancer Center
Learn how the laboratories for Moffitt Cancer Center have used some simple Groovy syntax to automatically retrieve and create data within Workflows and Data File Definitions.
3:00 PM – 3:30 PM | Leveraging LabVantage Webservices with Python
Paul Young, Sr. IT Engineer, Kaiser Permanente
This session will present how the Kaiser Permante Research Biobank is using Labvantage web services with Python to transfer data from external systems, automate tasks, and perform QA. I will cover the motivations and benefits of this and briefly cover alternatives. Sample Python code will be provided.
End Breakouts
3:30 PM – 5:00 PM | Break & Laboratory Fair
LabVantage & Customers
Have a snack, maybe a coffee, and walk around our Laboratory Fair featuring demo stations for NGS/OMICS Workflows, Configuration Management & Transfer (CMT), Scientific Data Management System (SDMS), Electronic Notebook (ELN), Portal, and the new LabVantage 8.9 features.
5:00 PM – 6:15 PM | Prepare for the Social Event
6:15 PM – 10:00 PM | Buses depart – Social Event at Nashville Underground
Tuesday night at CTEC US is always one of the moments that participants talk about for years to come. This year’s event will be held in downtown Nashville at Nashville Underground, Nashville’s ultimate entertainment destination. Take in the view from the only double-decker rooftop bar on Broadway. Enjoy the coldest beer in Music City, Southern inspired food, and take a ride on the mechanical bull. You will be living the modern country life!
This event is for 21 years and older only! Nashville venues always check IDs, so bring your driver’s license or similar identification.
Wednesday, April 26
7:30 AM – 11:30 AM | Registration Open
7:30 AM – 8:45 AM | Breakfast
9:00 AM – 9:30 AM | Using DB View to extend the reach of Ad Hoc queries
Wayne He, Associate Director of Software Engineering, Guardant Health
The ad hoc queries allow users to query and fetch data from a base SDC and other foreign key-linked SDCs. You may also set up extended fields with subqueries. However, extended fields cannot be used as search criteria, and they will work only when they are referred to from their base SDC. Adding a DB view allows us to get around this limitation so that we can freely join many related tables, and bring additional information for end users.
9:30 AM – 10:00 AM | LabVantage for Laboratory Medicine
Denise Bell, LabVantage Product Management
If you love our LIMS, then you must meet LabVantage Medical Suite, the one Laboratory Information System (LIS) developed for healthcare laboratories. It integrates all laboratory disciplines into one platform, sharing a single architecture and user interface while considering each specific discipline’s needs and workflows. Our one platform achieves laboratory harmonization allowing laboratorians to work seamlessly across chemistry, hematology, microbiology, anatomic pathology, genomics, molecular diagnostics, and more.
10:00 AM – 10:30 AM | Break
10:30 AM – 11:10 AM | Q&A With the LabVantage Leadership Team
LabVantage Leadership Team
This open-mic session is your chance to ask questions, hear answers, and give feedback directly to our LabVantage leaders. We look forward to hearing from you!
11:10 AM – 11:30 AM | Closing Remarks
11:30 AM – 12:30 PM | Lunch at leisure
A boxed lunch will be provided for participants that are heading to the airport, and those with a brief turn-around time into the training sessions.