The postdoc leaves.The equipment knowledge
goes with them.
The new PhD student now stands in front of a device he doesn't understand and the manual from 2003 doesn't help."
The last postdoc took the knowledge with them
30+ year old equipment with no living documentation
The publication deadline: the day after tomorrow."
Booking chaos over shared equipment
The data? Somewhere in handwritten logbooks, scattered across different folders, unusable for analysis."
Grant application with no usable equipment data
Was ist in dieser Zeit passiert? Niemand weiß es."
Documentation as a tedious obligation - not a tool
The result: logbooks are kept sporadically, errors go undocumented, solutions get lost.LabThunder flips this around: entries happen because they immediately benefit the PhD student - they see the equipment history, the last error, the next maintenance date.
Documentation becomes a tool instead of an obligation - and the equipment knowledge stays in the lab, even when the postdoc leaves.
3 - 6 months of onboarding time.
Knowledge that stays.
No matter who leaves.
SOPs, troubleshooting tips, and device-specific hacks, documented right at the machine and ready for the next user. Outgoing postdocs pass on their knowledge in a structured way, and new PhD students find exactly what they need, instantly.
Book all your equipment centrally—online, from your smartphone, and in real time. Say goodbye to double bookings, scheduling conflicts, and unfair resource distribution. You can even assign specific time slots to external users.
Scan → instant access: user manuals, recent errors, maintenance history, who last used the device, and what was done. For a 30-year-old HPLC just as easily as for the latest mass spectrometer.
Capacity utilization, hours of use per device, user groups – automatically tracked and ready for instant export. Applying for new equipment via the DFG? The data is ready, actionable, and compelling.
AI trained on all of the laboratory's manuals, SOPs, and error logs. "How do I configure method 7 on the HPLC?" – Get answers from your own knowledge base, not the internet. Even for equipment that has been running since 1998.
All maintenance intervals are monitored automatically, with reminders sent well in advance. Service visits are fully documented. For equipment designed to run for 30 years, a complete maintenance history is worth its weight in gold—and helps prevent costly downtime.