Cut Your Software Costs: CSBF Offers Shared Licenses to Research Labs

The software that biochemists, geneticists, and molecular biologists rely on to design experiments, analyze data, visualize molecules, communicate results, and manage their labs can be expensive. To help scientists save on these costs, the Beckman Center’s Computational Services and Bioinformatics Facility (CSBF) offers researchers discounted and shared licenses on some of the priciest and most popular software packages.

“It’s just like if you join a public library, you gain the ability to check out materials you need,” explains Lee Kozar, director of the CSBF. “We have a wide variety of software that can be shared, and it can really save researchers a significant amount of money.”

More than 4,000 researchers in 300 labs and 36 departments at Stanford University are currently CSBF affiliates, paying the equivalent of a few dollars a day to access scientific software that might otherwise cost thousands of dollars to license. Among the most popular programs: Adobe Creative Cloud, GraphPad, SnapGene, and BioRender.

Kozar and his colleagues also take requests from scientists who want to see new software added to the CSBF library. In cases where vendors won’t allow shared licenses, the service center can often negotiate discounts—that’s the case with BioRender, for instance.

“We added BioRender because a scientist came to me and asked for it; I talked with the company, found a way we could offer it at a discount, and started out with ten licenses,” Kozar recalls. “Those got gobbled up right away, and we’re now up to about 600 licenses for it.”

One of CSBF’s latest additions: Quartzy, a program that can help researchers manage their lab’s inventory and place orders for supplies. The program has long been free, but it is shifting to a paid subscription model this summer. However, Kozar negotiated a deal with the software vendor so that CSBF member labs can receive a license at nearly no cost.

Scientists who use CSBF’s resources also have a fast line to optimizing or troubleshooting problems with any software they obtain through the facility. While Kozar’s team directly supports only issues with installation and software access, they can direct users to the right person at a software company to get help. For some pieces of software, they also arrange training sessions for new users while they get the software up and running.

Despite the 300 labs that already take advantage of the CSBF, Kozar would love to see the facility help even more scientists. He says his software library often flies under researchers’ radar.

“We can save labs an awful lot of money; we take suggestions on how to expand our list of software, and we want to get the word out,” he says.