AI agents for R&D teams
Actionist is an AI automation tool whose agents operate the apps your team already uses. From scanning journals and patents by hand, to a digest that assembles itself and tax documentation that builds as you go.
R&D teams get back the hours lost to literature scans, experiment write-ups, deadline tracking, and tax credit paperwork.
AI Employees for R&D in 4 simple steps
Manual Time
We'll go over where you currently waste your time doing manual tasks.
Actionist Automations
We'll show you exactly how Actionist can automate these manual tasks.
Your Benefits
How much time and money you'll save by onboarding AI agents.
Easy to use
We'll show you how easy it is to enable AI across your business.
Where you spend your time
We know how your week actually goes
- Read what matters, skip what doesn'tAn agent monitors your reading list and surfaces only what is relevant to the team's actual work.
- Every result written up the day it happensExperiment outcomes get a proper write-up and land in the shared knowledge base before the details fade from memory.
- Funding deadlines that never sneak upEvery open call is tracked, with the outline and budget drafted weeks before the cutoff.
- Tax credit records built as you goQualifying hours and expenses are compiled on a schedule, so the year-end claim is a review, not a scramble.
- See the competition before it surprises youCompetitor patents, product claims, and conference talks are watched, and only real moves reach your inbox.
- Spend hours on the science, not the adminSamples get tracked, supplies reordered, and equipment scheduled automatically, so your week goes to the bench.
And hundreds of other tasks you do manually..
An agent can take a lot off your team's plate. Take a look below to see the time and cost you could save by adding AI agents to your R&D team's day.
Where the hours go
Staying current means reading new papers, preprints, and patent filings across every source yourself, and most weeks that reading never happens until a deadline forces it.
An agent monitors your team's watch list of journals, preprint servers, and patent databases and posts a ranked digest with the papers worth reading, on schedule.
Experiment results live in someone's notebook until the write-up gets done, which is why the knowledge base is always a quarter behind what the lab actually learned.
An agent drafts the results write-up from the logged data and outcome notes and files it into the knowledge base the same day the experiment closes.
Grant and funding deadlines get missed because they live in someone's calendar or inbox, not a shared system anyone actually checks.
An agent tracks every funding deadline against the application checklist and drafts the outline and budget sections weeks before the cutoff, not the night before.
Proving R&D tax credit eligibility means reconstructing months of time entries, project notes, and expense records by hand at year end.
An agent compiles the qualifying time, project documentation, and expense records into the substantiation pack on a schedule, so year end is a review, not a scramble.
Actionist Will Automate
What one automation looks like
A week with your R&D agents
Some of the apps for your R&D team
Some of the R&D apps your agent operates for you. Hundreds more are in the Actionist App Store.
Your Agent wakes up Automatically whenever something happens
Your agents watch the apps you already use and act the moment something happens, usually within about a minute, handle it based on your instructions, 24/7.
Your benefits
Where the time goes back
What you do manually today
What your agent runs for you
- R&D120 min / weekScanning journals and patents by hand
Someone reads through arXiv, journal feeds, and patent databases every week, and most weeks it slips until a deadline forces it.
R&D Agent0 minAgent monitors and posts a ranked digestAn agent reads the same sources on schedule and posts a one-paragraph summary of only what matches the team's watch list.
- R&D120 min / weekWriting up experiment results
Results sit in a notebook until someone finds the afternoon to write them up properly, which is why the knowledge base is always behind.
R&D Agent0 minAgent drafts the write-up the day it closesAn agent drafts a structured write-up from the logged data and files it into the knowledge base the same day the experiment ends.
- R&D180 min / weekBuilding the grant application from scratch
Someone starts each application from a blank document, rebuilding the outline and budget every cycle even when the science is similar to the last one.
R&D Agent0 minAgent drafts the outline from existing notesAn agent drafts the section-by-section outline and budget from the project's existing notes and past successful applications.
- R&D200 min / weekReconstructing tax credit documentation
Proving R&D tax credit eligibility means going back through months of time entries, project notes, and receipts by hand at year end.
R&D Agent0 minAgent compiles the pack on a running basisAn agent reconciles time and expenses against project codes every week and compiles the substantiation pack as the year goes, not after it.
- R&D90 min / weekChecking competitor patents and product pages
A researcher manually revisits competitor patent filings and product pages every so often, which means real changes get missed for weeks.
R&D Agent0 minAgent diffs pages and posts only real changesAn agent checks the same filings and pages on schedule and posts only the changes that actually happened, the day they happened.
What that's worth
Calculate what your team saves
Based on typical team usage: the visible tasks plus a few other automations the agent runs: ~6 hrs / person / week of admin work automated.
How easy it is to use
We'll do all the heavy lifting for you.
From entering your website address to having a working AI team, no effort from you.
- Step 1
Enter your website
- We'll research your business
- Automatically configure everything for you
- Step 2
Actionist Auto
Optional- Watches you work
- Creates your agents, workflows and schedules
- Step 3
Marketplace
- Hundreds of apps, plus agents and workflows
- Pre-configured by other users
- Step 4
Invite your team
- We'll automatically onboard them too
- Focus on the things that matter
Enter your website URL for a personalised demo
See exactly what Actionist would automate for your business.
You stay in control
An agent touching your unpublished results, your grant applications, and your competitive intel only earns its place if you stay in control of every move. Actionist is built so the researcher decides what goes out, the lab sees everything, and nothing irreversible happens without a human sign-off.
By default the agent writes digests, write-ups, and grant sections and queues them for review. Nothing goes to a funder, journal, or collaborator without a human choosing to send it.
Anything that deletes a notebook entry, submits an application, or shares data externally stops for explicit approval, regardless of how much autonomy you have granted elsewhere.
A full audit trail records every write-up drafted, every budget line touched, and every report built, so the PI can see exactly what the agent did and when.
Unpublished results, lab notebooks, and grant drafts are encrypted, never used to train models, and can be self-hosted on your own VPS if your institution requires it.
This team, in your industry
The same agents, set up for the way a specific industry works, its tools, its tasks, and the language its customers use.
Industry-specific versions of this team are coming soon.
Frequently asked questions
Does my R&D team need to be technical to set this up?
How do I get started?
How do I build a custom AI agent for a research workflow specific to my lab?
How quickly can I set Actionist up for the R&D team?
Where does our unpublished data live, and is it used to train AI?
Will it send anything to a funder or journal without me checking first?
What if our electronic lab notebook or grants portal has no API Actionist can connect to?
How does it know what counts as qualifying R&D work for the tax credit?
Which tools does this connect to?
See an agent turn a week of experiments into a digest and a filed write-up
Book a free demo and watch an Actionist agent monitor the literature, draft a results write-up, and track a grant deadline, end to end.