BioCipher Labs is a molecular diagnostics organization operating across multiple centers in India, with labs in Hyderabad, Bangalore, and a growing network of additional sites. The lab serves clinicians across 22 medical specialties, running close to 250 infectious disease panels using RT-PCR technology to deliver fast, reliable diagnostic results.

For a diagnostics lab of this breadth, the challenge of nucleic acid extraction is not simply one of throughput. It is one of standardization. When a single lab must reliably extract from swabs, blood, tissue, saliva, and a wide range of other body fluids - all within a tight clinical turnaround schedule - the extraction process becomes one of the most operationally complex parts of the entire workflow.

Managing that complexity manually, across a diverse and growing sample menu, was becoming increasingly difficult to sustain.

Lab snapshot

The limits of manual extraction across diverse sample types

When BioCipher Labs was founded, manual nucleic acid extraction was the primary mode of sample processing. For a general-purpose clinical diagnostic lab, this created an immediate challenge: the diversity of incoming sample types made it impossible to establish a single, consistent standard operating procedure for extraction.

Swabs, blood, tissues, and various body fluids each behave differently during extraction. Manual protocols that work reliably for one sample type may not translate to another, and the variability this introduced had a direct downstream effect on diagnostic results. The team frequently encountered errors that required re-extraction - repeating the process until acceptable results were obtained.

“The diversity of samples we received was really high. Because of that, the manual extraction was very challenging — we couldn’t fix a single SOP for multiple types of samples. That gave us a lot of error rate and also repeatability issues. We had to repeat the nucleic acid extraction and the test again and again until we got results.”

The cumulative time cost was significant. A process that should have taken a fraction of the working day was consuming five to six hours - largely driven by the need for repeated extractions. For a diagnostics lab operating on tight clinical schedules, this was not a sustainable position.

Four non-negotiables for automation

As the team evaluated options to automate and simplify their extraction workflow, they defined four requirements that any solution would need to meet.

The first was a small footprint and ease of use. Diagnostic labs operate with limited bench space and need instruments that can be deployed and operated simply - ideally with minimal operator involvement once a run is initiated. The team wanted a solution that could scale across multiple centers without creating training or complexity burdens at each new site.

The second was the ability to extract from diverse sample types. A platform that could only handle a narrow range of matrices would not solve the core problem. Multi-sample-type compatibility was essential.

The third was cost. For a growing diagnostics network, per-extraction cost directly affects the economics of scaling. The team required a solution that was competitive on cost relative to the established players in the Indian diagnostics market.

The fourth was quality and consistency. In a clinical diagnostic setting, CT value variability in RT-PCR directly affects result reliability. Extraction quality is not an abstract metric - it is the foundation on which every diagnostic call is made.

“Since we are working with medical samples, quality and consistency in the extraction were the most important things we were looking for.”

The team tested Manta alongside equipment from several other manufacturers over a rigorous one-month evaluation period, running multiple sample types alongside reference standards. Manta ranked first across the platforms evaluated.

“Among the top three, the top one was Manta - which consistently gave us good quality and quantity both on nanodrop and fluorimeter, and when we did RT-PCR and metagenomic studies, the results in terms of quality scores like CT value were well suited for our application and very consistent.”

From five hours to under thirty minutes

The operational change following Manta adoption was immediate. Extraction workflows that had previously taken five to six hours - extended by repeated re-extractions and the challenges of managing variable sample types manually - dropped to under 30 minutes per run, regardless of sample type or volume.

“Our entire process, which took roughly five to six hours using the manual process because of re-extraction and everything, is now cut short to less than 30 minutes - irrespective of the type of samples or the version of samples.”

The ability to use a single kit across diverse sample types was central to this improvement. By enabling a standardized SOP across all incoming sample matrices, Manta removed the need for type-specific protocols and the error-prone manual judgment calls that came with them.

The lab can now process up to 86 samples in a single extraction run, with consistent quality and quantity outputs across every batch. Crucially, the reduction in manual steps also reduced the error rate - eliminating much of the re-extraction burden that had made the previous workflow so time-intensive.

“Post inclusion of Manta in our process, we can extract close to 86 samples in a single shot with more consistent quality and quantity. It removed a lot of manual steps, which reduced our error rate.”

Consistent performance across 250 panels and stored samples

Biocipher Labs runs close to 250 diagnostic panels across 22 medical specialties, and virtually all of them now run through Manta. The team monitors performance monthly through QC repeats of known positive and negative samples - a rigorous internal benchmark that has consistently confirmed reliable extraction quality across the full panel menu.

One capability that stood out beyond initial expectations was Manta’s performance on long-stored samples. Samples that had been archived for over a year yielded good nucleic acid extraction quality - a meaningful advantage for a lab that may need to revisit stored clinical material.

“Consistently, Manta has performed really well for us - not only for fresh samples but also for samples that have been stored for more than a year. The nucleic acid extraction from these samples was also really good.”

For a platform that the team initially selected primarily for multi-sample-type flexibility, performance on long-stored material represented an unexpected and operationally useful benefit.

Scaling a standardized workflow across multiple centers

One of the most operationally significant outcomes of Manta adoption has been the ability to replicate a single extraction SOP across biocipher’s expanding network of diagnostic centers. The same protocol validated in Hyderabad has been deployed in Bangalore and is being rolled out to additional centers as the network grows.

For a multi-site diagnostics organization, this kind of workflow portability has real value. It removes the need to re-validate extraction protocols at each new location, reduces training complexity, and ensures that diagnostic quality remains consistent regardless of which center processes a sample.

“One thing that really surprised me is how a small footprint equipment like Manta was able to give consistent quality and quantity in terms of nucleic acid extractions - at times on par with the global leaders - at a very much competitive price.”

For labs evaluating automation in the infectious disease diagnostic space, the biocipher experience points to a straightforward conclusion: the case for automation is not only about volume. It is about building a workflow that is consistent, scalable, and operationally manageable - across every sample type, every panel, and every site where diagnostic work needs to happen.