Manual vs Automated Research Calculator — Discovery Cost Comparison | Blackridge Research

"Blackridge Research and Consulting"

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Free Comparison Tool

Manual vs Automated Research Calculator Interactive Calculator ✦

Your team already runs a project-discovery operation — it just runs on salaries, portal logins and travel budgets. Put the manual cost next to the automated one and see the gap.

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Your Inputs

Auto-filled with current list pricing — add to match your quote.

Your Estimated Results

Scenario:

Return multiple: Return on investment:
net of tracker cost
Payback period:
or annual investment

What this means

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Adjust the inputs above to calculate your results.

Why It Matters

You already pay for project intelligence — inefficiently

Every company pursuing projects has a discovery system. In most, it is artisanal: analysts and BD staff spending a share of every week scanning sources, subscriptions to portals and news services scattered across teams, trips justified as 'market visits,' and a manager stitching the fragments into something like a picture.

Automation changes the shape of the spend. The scanning layer moves to a platform doing it continuously across 150+ countries. Your people keep the judgment layer: qualifying, pursuing, winning.

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A true like-for-like: Fully-loaded people time on discovery, plus subscriptions and travel — against the tracker.
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Not just dollars: The freed analyst hours are shown explicitly, because redeployment is where the strategic value lives.
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An honest remainder: The 'with tracker' column keeps the manual share you judge non-automatable.
How It Works

Three steps to your number

01

Price the manual system

People doing discovery, salaries, share of time, subscriptions and travel.

02

Set the automatable share

How much discovery work a continuously updated database absorbs — 60-85% typical.

03

Compare the columns

Manual cost vs cost with tracker, net savings, hours freed and savings multiple.

Methodology & assumptions

Manual cost combines the discovery share of fully-loaded people time with direct discovery spend. The automatable share moves to the tracker.

Manual cost = People × Salary × 1.25 × Discovery share + Subscriptions + Travel
Automated = Manual cost × Automatable share
With tracker = (Manual cost - Automated) + Tracker investment
Net savings = Automated - Tracker investment
Hours freed = People × 2,080 × Discovery share × Automatable share
Use Cases

Who uses this calculator

Construction firms

Evaluate research automation.

EPC companies

Compare discovery methods.

FAQ

Your questions, answered

Teams typically judge 60-85% of discovery time automatable.
The mechanical portion: portal checks, news scanning, list building.
Enterprise Intelligence

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