Bia Analytical Win at Lab Awards 2025
At the end of a successful first day of attendance at The Lab Innovations 2025 conference, our team members Dr Maeve Shannon, Dr Stephanie Heaney and Eve Logan joined thousands of scientists, technicians, and laboratory professionals to experience the latest innovations, technologies in the lab community.
The conference attracts over 4,000 delegates and 200 exhibitors across two days, and features the annual Lab Awards, celebrating the achievements and successes of individuals, laboratories, and suppliers over the past year.
With six Lab Award nominations across four categories, Bia Analytical is delighted to announce that we won awards in two categories!
Rising Star
- Dr. Stephanie Heaney – Bia Analytical. Stephanie has made an immediate and lasting impact through her technical expertise, leadership, and dedication to innovation in food authenticity testing. Her passion for protecting food integrity, combined with her technical skill and leadership, makes her an exceptional winner of the Rising Star award.
We’re delighted to celebrate Dr Stephanie Heaney, winner of the Rising Star Award, recognising her outstanding contribution to food authenticity innovation and sustainable supply chain transparency.
“I’m truly honoured to receive an award at Lab Innovations 2025. I’m so grateful for the unwavering support, collaboration, and encouragement of my amazing team,” Dr Stephanie Heaney.
Stephanie has contributed to the development of 23 authenticity tests for the Biametric Portable NIR device, expanding rapid on-site testing capability across herbs, spices, and other high-risk ingredients. She has also played a leading role in the soya traceability project, developing models to determine country of origin and support compliance with the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR).
Her work in refining and validating Bia Analytical’s ISO 17025-accredited FTIR methods has helped ensure scientific robustness and commercial reliability across multiple test platforms. Stephanie’s expertise also featured in BBC Radio 4’s “Herb and Spice Scam?”, where she supported authenticity testing and analysis using the company’s portable technology.
This award recognises her significant technical contributions to safeguarding global food supply chains and advancing sustainable sourcing.
Best Automation & Data Innovation
- Bia Analytical – Biametric Portal & Risk Dashboard. The Biametric Portal began as a proof of concept to standardise how lab technicians ran predictive models. It rapidly evolved into a broader digital solution including our pioneering Risk Dashboard which provides accurate insights into commodity integrity and global supply chain risk.
Bia Analytical’s Biametric Portal represents a major step forward in digitalising and automating food authenticity testing. Designed to streamline every stage of sample processing, analysis, and reporting, the cloud-based platform replaces manual spreadsheets and paper workflows with a single, secure system that enhances accuracy, efficiency, and transparency.
One of the portal’s most powerful features is its AI-driven Risk Dashboard, developed to deliver real-time insights into global food fraud and adulteration risks. Using advanced generative AI technologies, the dashboard conducts large-scale deep research across thousands of commodities and markets, work that would take analysts years to complete manually, now achievable in less than a week. This innovation provides continuously updated intelligence on emerging risks, helping food businesses make informed decisions and protect consumers from mislabelling, contamination, and fraud.
The portal also integrates machine learning model predictions, enabling lab technicians to upload instrument data and receive instant authenticity results, including advanced 2D and 3D spectral analysis. Fully incorporated within Bia Analytical’s ISO 17025-accredited framework, the system ensures scientific rigour while significantly reducing manual workload and error risk.
Originally built to standardise model use within the lab, the Biametric Portal has evolved into a multi-tenant SaaS platform, which can be adopted by other laboratories and suppliers anywhere in the world. By providing accessible, reliable authenticity testing and risk insights, the portal supports safer, more transparent global food supply chains.
