Pharma companies and academic research institutions are under growing pressure to increase the return on their R&D investments. They require flexible automation systems that adapt easily to new applications. Users request to rapidly accommodate innovations provided by instrument suppliers on their systems, regardless of the vendor. However, due to the lack of compatibility, automation users are restricted in choosing specific instruments. Adapting existing hardware and software to new workflows is difficult and time consuming.

The SiLA standards cover the specifications that make devices exchangeable. But what is a standard without a guarantee, that the product claiming to be compliant actually is? So SiLA is going this extra mile and not only proposes on how to achieve compatibility but also delivers rules and regulations to prove its claims. SiLA not only defines a standard but also delivers the infrastructure where suppliers will get support from an independent validation authority to prove its claims.

Certification

For more information, please attend meeting of WG certification on March 28, 2012 in Stäfa

The SiLA Device Control & Data Interface Specification version 1.2 can be downloaded from our website. Some of the changes are

• an additional state in the main statemachine,
• an additional choice in the busy statemachine,
• allowing device class 0 in SiLA Return Value for basic suppliance,
• allowing the same data types for command calls and response events,
• more precise definition of ParameterSetCount, and
• syntax and range checks for each command call.

Standardization in Lab Automation

SLAS 2012 in San Diego, California, USA, is quickly approaching. This conference draws 5,000+ innovative scientists, engineers, researchers and technologists from academic, government and commercial laboratories around the globe as well as 275+ exhibitors.  This yields an unparalleled opportunity to interact with colleagues, reinforce existing relationships and forge new ones.

SLAS also provides an ideal venue for all of us who support the SiLA initiative to come together in one place at the same time.   With that in mind, we would like to invite you to an informal meeting to be held in our booth before the exhibition opens for the day. This will give you the opportunity to meet others from the industry who believe in the value of unified standards and support the initiative within their organizations, to share experiences and successes with using SiLA, and to meet with the newly formed SiLA Working Group USA and with some of the core SiLA leadership.   We will share with you the recent advances made by SiLA and the roadmap ahead.

So please join us for this informal gathering before the day gets started at SLAS 2012 and feel free to pass this invitation on to others within your organization.

Finally, we’d like to remind you that Dr. Niklaus Graber, SiLA Executive Board Member, Vice President will be presenting his talk,  “SiLA – Standardization in Lab Automation” at the Standards Initiatives Special Interest Group session on Wednesday afternoon, from 11:30 to 1:00.  Dr. Graber’s talk will show what standards are currently being developed by SiLA, how workgroups are formed for the development and how various parties contribute to these standards. Come to hear this informative talk.

SiLA informal gathering:

Place:  Room 15A on the mezzanine level

Time:  Monday, February 6, 8:00AM

Coffee and pastries will be served

To RSVP or for questions please contact:

Gregory Wendel, Ph.D.

Cell: 978-460-5230

e-mail: gwendel@siegelcg.com

For more information, visit SiLA at booth 845

10th January 2012, Bubenreuth Germany

After an initial meeting during MIPTEC in Basel with various interested parties from SiLA organization, it was decided to start a working group “WG Certification” to define the scope and procedure of a SiLA specific certification process. The overall objective is to establish and maintain quality management system for the SiLA label licensed to manufacturers of SiLA compliant products. It was pointed out, that SiLA is ready to defend its trademark against any fraud or unlicensed use in order to protect its value in high quality lab standardization.

Based on the presentation shown at MIPTEC we prepared an augmented version of a general procedure for certification. All in all it defines the procedures for accreditation of test sites, the assignment of auditors and the accreditation of test sites. These entities will be supplemented by an “Interoperability Facility” which will be established and operated with the purpose allowing to test the inter-operability of SiLA certified products and to ensure a smooth operation of multi-vendor installations. By this means there will be a neutral facility to enable co-operation during product development beyond pure compliance with the standard certification of products.

How the certification process works

Prerequisites handled by SiLA organization in order to establish the certification process are as:

• Standards need to be defined and approved by SiLA
• Certification office needs to be established
• Test sites need to be accredited

In order to test a SiLA compliant device a manufacturer is assumed to:

• Put his devices through extensive internal testing.
• Then contracts an accredited test site (optional: could be at manufacturer organization) for an independent conformity test.
• Next, the test-site tests the software in compliance with the rules of the SiLA certification office and issues a test report

How certificates are issued:

• The manufacturer submits the test report to the certification office
• and receives a certificate of conformance.
• The certified product is listed in the catalog of certified products

We are very happy to announce that Chemspeed (Augst, Switzerland) has signed up for supporting membership with SiLA.

We are very happy to announce that Agilent Technologies (Santa Clara) signed up as supporting member with SiLA.

We are very happy to announce that Cognizant, the leading global services partner for the life sciences industry, signed up for Core Membership with SiLA. Our collaboration with Cognizant will mainly focus on further progressing and extending our  standardization initiatives for data interfaces.

We are very happy to announce that Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts signed up for core membership with SiLA.