Ginkgo Bioworks has been selected to build an autonomous laboratory at Novo’s new research and development site in Waltham, Massachusetts, expanding a multi-year relationship between the biotechnology companies.
The autonomous lab will be powered by Ginkgo’s Reconfigurable Automation Cart, or RAC, architecture and is intended to bring advanced robotics, laboratory automation, and artificial intelligence directly into Novo’s internal U.S. research operations.
Novo is purchasing the autonomous lab from Ginkgo after previously working with the company as an external research and development partner.
The expanded relationship means Ginkgo will now also provide the automation tools and software used inside Novo’s own laboratories, representing a deeper integration of Ginkgo’s technology into the pharmaceutical company’s R&D infrastructure.
Ginkgo’s autonomous laboratory platform combines flexible robotic hardware with its Catalyst integrated software.
The system is designed to automate experimental workflows while maintaining the flexibility scientists traditionally associate with manual laboratory work.
Ginkgo says its autonomous systems can provide the speed, scale, and reproducibility of laboratory automation without requiring researchers to sacrifice the adaptability of a conventional lab bench.
The technology can also connect with AI agents capable of writing experimental protocols or acting as a scientific co-pilot, allowing artificial intelligence to participate more directly in the experimental process.
That combination could allow laboratory experiments to operate with less direct manual intervention while generating more standardized and reproducible results.
Autonomous laboratories are designed to connect experimental planning, robotic execution, and data collection into a more continuous workflow.
Rather than requiring researchers to manually perform every laboratory step, software can coordinate instruments and robotic systems and collect results to inform subsequent experiments.
When paired with AI systems, that infrastructure could eventually make parts of the scientific process more iterative.
An AI system could potentially help develop a protocol, send instructions to laboratory automation, analyze resulting data, and inform the design of subsequent experiments while scientists remain responsible for broader research objectives and interpretation.
For pharmaceutical companies, the potential benefits include running more experiments, improving reproducibility, and allowing scientists to spend more time on analysis, experimental design, and scientific discovery rather than on repetitive manual laboratory procedures.
The agreement also reflects increasing interest across the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries in combining laboratory robotics with artificial intelligence.
Ginkgo described the Novo deployment as part of a broader shift away from traditional manual laboratory benches and individual pieces of walk-up automation toward more integrated autonomous laboratory environments.
Novo’s decision to install the system internally is particularly notable because the companies had already established a relationship through external R&D work.
The new arrangement expands Ginkgo’s role from providing research services to supplying infrastructure that Novo scientists can use directly inside their own laboratories.
The deployment will take place at Novo’s new U.S. R&D site in Waltham, Massachusetts.
The site will provide Novo researchers with access to Ginkgo’s RAC architecture and associated software as the pharmaceutical company increases its use of robotics and AI within research operations.
Ginkgo’s RAC architecture is designed around reconfigurability, allowing laboratory automation to be adapted as scientific programs and workflows change rather than being limited to a single fixed experimental process.
That flexibility can be important in pharmaceutical research, where scientists may need to conduct different types of experiments across multiple discovery programs.
The partnership also highlights the growing role of AI infrastructure within drug discovery.
Much of the industry’s early discussion around AI has focused on computational applications such as identifying drug targets, analyzing biological datasets, and predicting molecular properties.
Autonomous laboratories extend AI further into the physical research environment by connecting computational systems with the robotics that actually perform experiments.
Ginkgo sees that connection between software and physical experimentation as an important part of the future of biological research.
The company develops tools intended to make biology easier to engineer and operates autonomous laboratories designed to replace or automate portions of manual laboratory work.
Ginkgo also operates its own autonomous laboratory infrastructure, which customers can access through its Datapoints and Solutions contract research services.
The Novo project gives Ginkgo another opportunity to deploy the technology directly within a major pharmaceutical company’s internal research organization rather than solely operating experiments on behalf of customers through Ginkgo-controlled infrastructure.
As autonomous laboratory technology develops, pharmaceutical companies could increasingly use robotics and AI together to increase experimental throughput while creating more standardized datasets for machine learning and other computational research tools.
The long-term opportunity is to create a tighter loop between scientific hypotheses, automated experiments and the data used to determine what researchers should test next.
For Novo, the Waltham deployment represents another investment in building AI and robotics directly into pharmaceutical R&D.
For Ginkgo, the agreement expands an existing customer relationship and provides another example of its autonomous laboratory technology being deployed directly within a life sciences company’s research environment.
KEY QUOTES:
“Novo continues to lead the industry in bringing AI and robotics into pharma R&D with their investment in autonomous labs. We’re proud to partner with Novo to put our robotics directly in the hands of Novo scientists. I’m excited about a future where autonomous labs run lab experiments around the clock and free scientists to focus on analysis and discovery.”
Jason Kelly, Co-Founder and CEO of Ginkgo Bioworks
