XiltriX Prevents A Catastrophic Failure During A Lab Power Outage

“Without XiltriX, we wouldn’t have known the power was out, everything would have been lost over the course of the weekend.”

Facilities & Operations Manager

San Diego Biotech Company’s Scientific Assets Protected During Power Outage with XiltriX

A rapidly growing biotechnology company in San Diego, specializing in clinical-stage pharmaceutical research, development, and manufacturing, recently implemented the XiltriX laboratory monitoring solution to safeguard its valuable scientific assets. They selected XiltriX for its 24/7 live agent support and risk mitigation strategy.

XiltriX is a laboratory monitoring solution designed to protect valuable scientific assets and equipment by continuously monitoring laboratory devices and ambient conditions in life science facilities. It tracks data outputs from various lab equipment and sensors—including refrigerators, freezers, cryotanks, incubators, backup generators, and HVAC systems. XiltriX provides real-time access to data, notifications, and reports of any deviations or failures, ensuring that critical assets remain protected at all times.

The Challenge

The laboratory and facilities staff at this biotech company had left for the day on Friday, looking forward to the upcoming Labor Day weekend.

Unfortunately, around 10:30 PM that night, a major power failure blew out the two main electric breakers at the facility. This total laboratory power outage could have spelled disaster for any biotech laboratory. An extended weekend without power would likely result in the catastrophic loss of invaluable scientific assets and months, if not years, of progress. Freezer farms, vivariums, incubators, and other storage areas would be compromised without immediate attention. Typical monitoring solutions, such as data loggers or other disparate systems, might not have provided adequate alarms and notifications. This would mean the appropriate personnel would not discover the failure until Tuesday morning, after their samples and precious assets were already destroyed.

The XiltriX alarm escalation protocol is far more robust than other systems, including text messages, phone calls, and emails sent to designated personnel. If the employee receiving the notification does not acknowledge the issue, or the messages are not responded to within an allotted time, the system will continue to send real-time notifications through other channels until the issue is addressed and all ambient parameters return to expected ranges. If the failure remains unaddressed, the XiltriX SafetyNet team will intercede, similar to a quality home-alarm monitoring system, to ensure that the appropriate management staff is aware of the issue and is reacting promptly to mitigate any loss.

Other systems may claim to deliver real-time notifications but often only send notification pulses every 15-60 minutes. Some might not work during a total power failure or a break in internet connectivity or phone service. Others may send automated alerts only through a single medium, or the alerts will not persist if not attended to. Often, alerts go unnoticed if a phone is silenced, or emails go unchecked in the middle of the night. XiltriX provides a SafetyNet team to help monitor your facility. The XiltriX solution monitors every sensor every five seconds. In the case of a power outage like the one at this biotech company, every second counts. XiltriX devices are built with redundant, fail-safe architecture and each XiltriX device is equipped with a 48-hour backup battery and multiple communication methods, ensuring no power failure would take the system down. Monitoring power consumption in your lab is essential.

The Solution

Luckily, this biotech company implemented the XiltriX solution with its Monitoring-as-a-Service model, avoiding the pitfalls of disparate data loggers and less robust monitoring systems. With XiltriX in place, the Facilities & Operations Manager received alarms and notifications about the power outage via text message on his mobile phone, followed by a phone call from the XiltriX SafetyNet team to ensure he was aware of the issues. This enabled the Facilities team to act quickly and effectively to protect the invaluable scientific assets stored in their facility.

The appropriate personnel logged into the XiltriX solution from their laptops at home and identified the major issues. The XiltriX system indicated that due to the two breakers being down, the backup generator had started but was not supplying power properly.

From late Friday evening to early Saturday morning, the Facilities & Operations team worked on-site to save the samples in every refrigerator, freezer, and incubator, as well as to preserve conditions in their vivarium. They leveraged real-time data and alarms provided by the XiltriX system to identify critical outputs and address the most urgent issues immediately. No samples were lost, and their scientific progress was protected.

According to the Facilities & Operations Manager, “Without XiltriX, we wouldn’t have known the power was out; everything would have been lost over the course of the weekend.”

The Result

Although the power failures and subsequent alarms disrupted the team’s sleep that night, they now rest assured knowing that, in the event of any future catastrophe, they have the watchful eye of XiltriX to help them respond quickly and effectively.

The Facilities & Operations Manager added, “After the power outage incident, we decided to extend the XiltriX monitoring to include the HVAC system.” It turns out one of the HVAC units was the root cause of the power outage. Having XiltriX monitor this equipment adds a crucial layer of protection for the organization moving forward. This monitoring provides users with complete peace of mind, knowing their invaluable assets, equipment, and important research are properly safeguarded.

XiltriX offers ease of implementation for any size facility and can be centrally managed across multiple locations. The 24/7 SafetyNet team provides continuous live agent monitoring, ensuring that customers can be certain their science is protected around the clock. The XiltriX solution is easily implemented at life science organizations at any stage of development, from startups to scale-ups to large enterprise, multi-site operations.