Case Study

How Tropic Achieved Operational Excellence with Trackmedium's QMS Introduction

CASE STUDY
How Tropic Achieved Operational Excellence with Trackmedium's QMS

Challenge

Tropic Biosciences UK Ltd ('Tropic') is a leading agricultural biotechnology company based in Norwich, UK dedicated to developing and commercializing high-performing varieties of tropical crops which provide significant value to growers, processors, and consumers. Tropic's vision is to become a sector-dominant seed business with significant ownership of its products from the laboratory to the field, while maintaining positive relationships with growers and consumers based on transparency, trust, and alignment of interests.

Tropic boasts a complement of over 150 experienced business professionals and leading technology experts striving to be the frontrunner and pioneers in the agricultural gene editing sector.

Tropic is a rapidly evolving organisation; its growth, and movement towards launch of its first product requires controlled processes and a robust Quality Management System. Following its first successful external audit Tropic identified a need for improved efficiency and after scouring the market decided on Trackmedium as its electronic Quality Management System. Trackmedium's flexibility and customisability allowed Tropic to centralise its quality management processes and support future growth of the system.

About

Tropic Biosciences is a cutting-edge biotechnology company based in Norwich, UK, specializing in advanced solutions dedicated to solving some of the agricultural industry's toughest challenges through genetic advancements. With a strong focus on tropical agriculture, the company focuses on leveraging gene-editing technologies to develop resilient, sustainable crop varieties that address global agricultural challenges, including food security and climate change. By working closely with farmers, researchers, and industry partners, Tropic aims to enhance crop yield, improve resistance to environmental stresses, and reduce the need for chemical inputs. Committed to sustainable practices and ethical innovation, Tropic is at the forefront of agricultural biotechnology, driving positive environmental and social impact.

Employees:

150+


Industry:

Agricultural Biotechnology


Industry Affiliations and Standards:

TROPIC is a member of Excellence Through Stewardship ("ETS") and Plant Breeding Innovation Management Program ("PBI"), schemes operated by the Global Stewardship Group which offers programs for management of agriculture technologies.


Location:

UK


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Approach

Tropic implemented Trackmedium's Quality Management System (QMS) to streamline their quality assurance processes and address their requirements across multiple modules.

The solution provided comprehensive workflow automation, improved efficiency, and eliminated the need for manual processes, ultimately freeing up valuable resources. The key modules implemented included:

  1. Audit Management
    • Enabled efficient planning, execution, and tracking of audit activities, ensuring compliance and readiness for external audits or inspections.
  2. CAPA (Corrective and Preventive Action)
    • Provided a systematic approach to issue reporting & enabled recording of root cause analysis and corrective actions, fostering a proactive quality culture.
  3. Document Control
    • Centralized document storage with version control, and automated workflow steps to reduce resource burden, allowing easy retrieval and centralised access for all end users.
  4. Health & Safety Reporting
    • Customized from Trackmedium's Incident Management module to support health and safety reporting, to help create a safer work environment and addressing challenges related to manual file management.
  1. Inspections
    • Adapted from the Simple Audit module to facilitate routine inspections, ensuring adherence to internal and external standards.
  2. Management of Change (MoC)
    • Systematically managed and documented changes, ensuring rigorous review and recorded approval processes which were previously difficult to manage due to time constraints.
  3. Meetings Management
    • treamlined the tracking of Quality Management Review meeting agendas and minutes The module centralises our records & makes them available for applicable end users.
  4. Supplier Management
    • Facilitated supplier qualification and performance monitoring, ensuring high standards across the supply chain.centralised access for all end users.
  5. Training Management
    • Centralized employee training records to ensure compliance with required standards.
  6. Tropic Improvement Ideas
    • Customized from the Miscellaneous Approvals module to encourage and track team suggestions, to foster a culture of continuous improvement.

Results

Implementing Trackmedium's QMS delivered measurable improvements:

  • Enhanced Operational Efficiency:
    The automation of CAPA, document control, and audit processes reduced manual workloads by up to 40%, enabling Tropic to resolve CAPAs and manage documentation more efficiently to focus on proactive quality improvements.
  • Process Improvement Efficiency:
    Trackmedium's automated workflows enabled Tropic to maintain an agile Quality Assurance department and allowed growth of the Quality Management System whilst saving manual process administration time, thus freeing resources within the department to enable these improvements.
  • Improved Compliance and Audit Readiness:
    With the Audit Management, CAPA and Document Control modules, document retrieval times were cut by up to 60%, ensuring up-to-date records and seamless preparation for audits. The smooth linking of modules in Trackmedium meant that audit results, CAPA resolutions and document changes can be linked together to create a coherent and complete audit trail.
  • Health & Safety Enhancements:
    Custom Health & Safety Reporting enabled all users to access the same reporting platform & enabled more seamless centralisation of issue resolution. The charting from the module also improved Tropic's ability to make data accessible to senior leaders & interested parties.
  • Continuous Improvement Culture:
    Tropic's employees gained valuable new skills through hands-on experience with the platform supported by the QA Team, which without Trackmedium's efficiency improvements could not have happened. This enabled professional development across Tropic's team & development of new skills. QA could then offer support as a consulting function in process development, improvement and issue resolution which has created a fundamental shift in the team's effectiveness

Conclusion

This approach allowed Tropic to scale its operations efficiently, without the need for additional hires, while maintaining compliance and process efficiency. Trackmedium's automation and flexibility empowered the QA team to focus on higher-value activities, positioning them as continuous improvement experts rather than an administrative burden.

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"Trackmedium's QMS has completely transformed our quality management processes. Its flexibility allowed us to tailor modules to our unique needs, significantly improving efficiency without compromising compliance. With Trackmedium, we've been able to manage exponential growth with our quality management processes comprised of a lean team, saving significant costs while driving real improvement. The culture of continuous improvement Trackmedium fosters has been a game-changer for our team."


- Catherine Bennett, Head of Quality & ESG,
Tropic Biosciences UK Ltd
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