Link Biosciences Case Study
Link Biosciences runs a specialized personalized-nutrition business that ready-made software could not handle. We learned their formulas, production process, and machines firsthand. We built Sigma to connect customer rules, orders, batching, and production. The same senior team still supports new needs.
About 5 minutes. No sales call required.
Built with Link Biosciences, a B2B operational engine for companies offering personalized supplements.
~300 → 1000s
Daily orders software supports (up from manual limits)
~1,200
Orders routinely processed for a single customer in one day
Portal
Customer visibility into formulas, orders, production, and shipping
Ongoing
Long-term support as needs change
With a second production machine online, daily capacity reached nearly 2,000 orders. That throughput reflects both software and added hardware.
Client
Link Biosciences — a B2B operational engine for companies offering personalized supplements.
Industry
Custom nutrition / personalized supplement operations.
Challenge
Highly custom formula and fulfillment workflows could not grow through manual steps and generic tools.
Solution
A custom software platform — Sigma — connected to specialized production hardware and customer-facing workflows.
Outcome
Higher throughput, better visibility, order management that can scale, and continued support as the operation changes.
Link Biosciences’ work is unique because every client can use different data and formula rules. Depending on the customer, the system may need DNA data, gut biome data, lifestyle surveys, custom recipes, and production limits — then turn all of that into an exact personalized formula and a real production order.
Before Sigma, the business held that complexity together with manual steps and tools that did not connect.
Microsoft Access databases holding key operational data.
Spreadsheets used to track customers, orders, and formulas.
Manual clean-room documentation for production.
A generic system that needed heavy ongoing support.
A lot of programmer support just to keep the process running.
Manual ingredient weighing and batching on the production floor.
Disconnected customer, order, and formula tracking.
Labor-intensive workflows that were hard to track and costly to scale.
The problem was not missing software. None of the software understood the business.
The old process could make about 300 orders per day — but it took a lot of manual labor and overhead. The limit was not ambition. It was the manual, broken-up system underneath.
Link Biosciences was not a standard online store or fulfillment business. It was a custom formula engine. A generic platform could not easily account for the reality of how the operation actually worked.
“For a business this specialized, software needs do not arrive ready-made. You discover them by understanding how the operation works.”
21 Solutions did not wait for perfect specs. Through Sergei Golimbievsky’s work, the team got close to the operation, learned how the business actually ran, and built software around the real workflow — not an ideal version.
“Sergei took the time to understand the process, the user, the formulas, and the machine. That made him different from other developers.”
The tech choice followed understanding the business: connect customer rules, formula logic, production batching, and hardware in one system built around the way Link actually works.
Sigma is the software platform 21 Solutions built for Link Biosciences. It became the central system connecting work that had depended on manual handoffs, spreadsheets, Access databases, and workarounds.
Sigma gave Link Biosciences one system connecting work that had previously depended on manual handoffs, spreadsheets, Access databases, and workarounds.
Throughput
Previously about 300 orders per day through manual production workflows. Sigma supports thousands of orders per day from a software standpoint, with production limited more by hardware and staffing than the software itself. The team has routinely processed around 1,200 orders for a single customer in one day; with a second machine, capacity reached nearly 2,000 daily orders.
Speed
Manual production and documentation once took a lot of time. Now formulas are generated as orders enter Sigma, then batched for production. Batches can move through production in minutes, with a batch often containing hundreds of orders.
Customer visibility
Customers previously relied on spreadsheets and less clear processes. Now they can log into a system, view formulas, see order progress, monitor production status, and track shipping.
Flexibility
The business was once limited by rigid systems and manual workflows. Link Biosciences can now support different types of clients — including those using DNA, gut biome, survey-based, or recipe-driven personalization models.
Continued involvement
21 Solutions still supports new needs with the business and system knowledge gained through the original work.
Unified operation
Sigma connected customer data, formulas, orders, batching, and production — replacing a patchwork of Access databases, spreadsheets, and manual handoffs with one central system.
Throughput at the highest volumes reflects both Sigma and added production hardware capacity. Production still involves staffing and hardware, and is not fully automated end to end.
As Link grew and leadership evaluated its systems and outside relationships, the internal team pushed to keep 21 Solutions involved because future changes depended on both the system and the business knowledge behind it.
When new leadership considered reducing the external development relationship, the internal recommendation was straightforward: continued growth and change required people who already understood the operation. 21 Solutions kept learning, talking with leadership, and delivering.
This is a normal part of leadership evaluation. In this case, it reinforced the value of the partnership rather than replacing it.
“For a custom process, you get custom problems. 21 Solutions understood how to work outside the box.”
Why continuity matters here
If your team relies on spreadsheets, manual workarounds, disconnected systems, or software that does not match how the business actually operates, 21 Solutions can help you turn that complexity into a system that scales.
