Keeping business from going elsewhere

[beetle_doc]

Don't know if this is the right forum for this question. We have lost a substantial amount of our on campus illumina sequencing business to other service providers (mostly BGI) over the last year. I have talked to some of our researchers and this is almost exclusively due to our rates being too high. We are still running a HiSeq 2500 with v3 chemistry as our instrument was too old to upgrade to the v4 chemistry. We are thinking about getting a HiSeq 4000 to hopefully allow us to reduce our rates. However, I am not sure if or when this will happen.

I took a look online and our prices are similar to what other core facilities are charging. My questions are: Have other core facilities seen a drop in their business and what steps are you taking to keep your on campus customer base?
Thanks

[ymc]

I think BGI and Illumina are not in good terms now. So if you can get a 4000, it certainly helps.

But how could you lose your on campus customers? Aren't they supposed to get lower rate than outsiders? If your internal rate is similar to other people's outsider rate, then it is no surprise that you are losing customers.

[sarvidsson]

Offer high quality, customized services with good support. It is difficult to win on price for bulk sequencing alone.