HighRes partners with life science organizations to implement intelligent data and lab automation workflows that empower every team member to plan and execute efficient and reproducible science. At SLAS2026, HighRes was joined by three distinguished partner organizations — Enveda, Pfizer, and Merck — each sharing their real-world experiences building and evolving high-throughput screening and sample management platforms powered by HighRes automation.
This customer spotlight series features the stories and insights shared by each partner, offering a window into the practical challenges, strategic decisions, and operational outcomes that define world-class lab automation in drug discovery.
Presented by Katie Heiser, Director of Platform Biology
Enveda is on a mission to unlock the biological potential of nature's chemistry. While it is well established that many efficacious modern medicines, including metformin, aspirin, artemisinin, and penicillin, have come from natural sources, less than 1% of nature's chemistry has been characterized. Importantly, natural products also demonstrate improved rates of clinical translation, with nearly 50% better odds of reaching Phase 3 clinical trials compared to purely synthetic compounds.
Founded to address this vast untapped potential, Enveda operates one of the world's largest libraries of natural biomasses, sourced from plants, microbes, and fungi. The company is building the world's first chemical sequencer for life — a platform that annotates the structure and function of nature's molecules at scale, using machine learning to translate mass spec data into chemical structures.
Enveda's Platform Biology team, led by Katie Heiser, is responsible for annotating the function of nature's chemistry. The team of eight scientists and associates runs an end-to-end early discovery platform including assay onboarding, cell culture, data processing, data analysis, and automation operations. Their screening funnel includes:
The majority of Enveda's discovery platform operates in 1536-well ultra-high-throughput format, with flexibility for 384-well and 96-well assays as needed.
Enveda's approach to automation centers on a clear philosophy: automate the low-complexity, time-intensive steps with high-capacity, fit-for-purpose systems. This keeps robustness high and scheduling complexity low, enabling autonomous operation without errors.
The team operates three core Nucleus automation systems, each designed with intentional upgradability:
All three systems are equipped with webcams for remote monitoring and troubleshooting. Critically, each was designed with HighRes to leave space for future upgrades, a strategy that paid off when Enveda added a SteriStore and Multidrop dispenser to the compound printing system.
Video 1. Enveda's Automation Journey
Download a copy of Katie's slides here.
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