Cloud-Based Strategies Set to Revitalize the U.S LIMS Market

High costs and long life-span of products the laboratory information management systems (LIMS) market has not grown significantly in the last decade. Analysis from Frost & Sullivan, Analysis of the US LIMS Market, finds that the market earned revenues of $218.4 million in 2014 and estimates this to reach $250.7 million in 2018.

Providing adaptable systems that can be tailored to a specific industry will help manufacturers widen their consumer base in the U.S. LIMS market. Catering to the fragmented needs of laboratories has led to the deployment of unstandardized products, increasing costs and deterring end users from investing in these solutions.

“To boost adoption, vendors need to offer software that is malleable rather than products with a range of capabilities that are redundant to specific needs,” said Frost & Sullivan Healthcare Industry Analyst Aish Vivekanandan. “LIMS vendors must also build systems that can unify laboratories, allow for easy access to data, and enable user-friendly analysis.”

To meet these requirements, consumers are beginning to switch to cheaper next-generation cloud-based and thin-client systems. In fact, cloud-native solutions could revolutionize LIMS due to their flexibility in terms of data, functionality and configuration abilities.

“The integration of cloud-native models with LIMS will eventually become a norm as laboratories leverage this system to gain remote access to multi-user, multi-device features for a competitive price,” remarked Vivekanandan. “Thus, any vendor distributing proprietary software, where certain processes are restricted, will eventually lose consumers to open-sourced, Web-based and cloud-native suppliers.”