Going Digital in a Small Dental Laboratory: the 6-Month Roadmap

Going digital in a small dental laboratory is not settled over a weekend. Across six months, a laboratory of two to five people can change how it is organized. It moves from juggling several scanner portals daily to a centralized flow, without stopping production. Here is the roadmap, step by step, built for the pace of a small structure.

No total overhaul overnight, no CAD software to change, no budget out of proportion. Each month advances one precise point, measurable and reversible if need be.

Month 1: taking stock of the impression flow

Before choosing a tool, you first have to know what actually happens in the laboratory. How many different portals does a technician open each day to retrieve an impression? How many cases are typed in by hand in the management system?

That inventory takes one to two weeks in a small structure. It is enough to note, case by case, the brand of scanner the dentist used and the portal the file lands in. Add the time spent retrieving it and then transferring it to the CAD workstation.

The picture takes on particular relief in a sector that is consolidating. According to l'Information Dentaire, France counts close to 3,600 laboratories for 18,100 people working in them, a grouping movement already under way. A small laboratory that keeps a manual flow falls behind structures that are already pooling their tools.

The stocktaking ends with a short list. It brings together the scanners the partner dentists actually use, the associated portals, and the number of avoidable re-entries each day. That list is the base for everything else in the roadmap.

Month 2: choosing the first irritant to fix

A small team cannot run three projects in parallel. Month 2 is for deciding: which point costs the most time today?

For many small laboratories, the problem is not case volume but the number of portals to watch. The intraoral scanner market keeps widening: according to Mordor Intelligence, it is growing at around 11% a year between 2026 and 2031. Every new scanner adopted by a partner dentist potentially adds one more portal to check, whatever the number of cases handled each day.

The point bears repeating: the number of brands weighs on the organization even when case volume stays flat. A laboratory working with four dentists on four different scanners is already juggling four ecosystems, whether it handles ten or fifty cases a day.

The wider market confirms the underlying trend. According to Fortune Business Insights, digital dentistry would go from 5.47 billion dollars in 2026 to 11.13 billion dollars in 2034. That movement will not slow the spread of scanner brands among dentists.

Choosing a single irritant lets you move quickly without tying the whole team to a vague project. It is often centralizing the portals or ending manual re-keying.

Month 3: testing a centralized flow on a limited scope

Month 3 stays a test, not a full switch. The idea: pick two or three partner dentists. Their impressions then travel through a single entry point for a few weeks, without touching the rest of the flow.

This is where a free trial of 100 cases over 14 days makes full sense for a small laboratory. The test runs with no commitment, on a reduced scope, before any budget decision.

The test means checking compatibility with the partner dentists' scanners. Medit offers its own platform, Medit Link, which receives cases from the brand's own scanners. It exports files in STL to Exocad directly; toward 3Shape Dental System, the export stays manual and the import depends on the recipient's license. Dentsply Sirona follows a nearby logic with DS Core, its cloud platform for laboratories.

Other manufacturers open their export further. Align Technology offers MyiTero, a free cloud portal with unlimited storage, which delivers scans into Exocad through a dedicated connector. Shining3D works differently: its Aoralscan 3 exports in STL, OBJ or PLY, and its acquisition software links straight to Exocad. Dexis's Quick Connect network transfers STL, PLY and OBJ files, as well as the xOrder and .dentalProject formats, with no extra fee or license.

On that test scope, the aim stays modest. It is to check that each case arrives in the right place, with no re-keying, and to compare the time spent before and during the test.

Month 4: extending to every dentist and every scanner

Once the test holds up, month 4 is about extending the centralized flow to all the partner dentists. Whatever brand of scanner each one has.

It is also the moment to check compatibility with the CAD software or ERP already in place at the laboratory. Today that list includes Exocad, Logidents and MIA Soft. It extends to more recent tools such as AI4Dental or Relu, and will probably keep widening.

That extension does not mean changing CAD software. A laboratory goes on designing its restorations in Exocad or whatever tool is already in place. Only what comes before design changes: how the impression is retrieved and passed on.

For a small structure, this step happens dentist by dentist rather than all at once. Adding a new scanner to the centralized flow takes a few minutes, with no heavy technical work on the laboratory side.

Month 5: securing HDS and GDPR compliance during the switch

A digital impression remains health data. In France, hosting it means going through an HDS-certified provider. The Agence du Numérique en Santé sets this out, under article L.1111-8 of the Code de la santé publique, the French public health code.

That certification is not a marketing label. It builds on the ISO 27001 standard, which governs information security management at the host. A small laboratory generally has neither the time nor the interest to pursue that certification itself for an internal server.

During the switch, the question to ask of each tool added to the flow stays the same. Where is the data hosted, and is the host HDS-certified in France? DigiLab announces HDS hosting in France, with medical-grade encryption (AES-256).

The GDPR applies in parallel, whatever the number of dentists connected to the laboratory's account. Checking that point month by month, rather than once at the end, avoids unpleasant surprises when the flow is generalized.

Month 6: measuring the time gained and adjusting the flow

The last month is for comparing the starting point, noted in month 1, with the real situation six months later. How many portals are left to check each day? How much re-keying remains?

Management software helps automate that measurement. One laboratory software vendor points out that it makes case tracking, production planning and stock control easier. That automation makes visible what used to stay approximate: the time actually spent on administrative tasks rather than on production.

Analyses run in business across sectors put the manual entry time for an order at between 5 and 15 minutes. It is a cross-sector order of magnitude, useful for estimating what repeated re-keying represents over a production day.

DigiLab announces, on that basis, an average saving of about one full-time equivalent per month for a laboratory that centralizes its impression reception. That figure remains an average announced by the vendor: each laboratory has to check it on its own cases during the test phase.

This sixth month is not an end in itself. It is for adjusting. You keep what works and revisit what still slows the flow. You also decide whether a new dentist or a new scanner should join the scope covered.

The cost of standing still against the cost of changing

A small laboratory often hesitates to start. The cost of changing looks immediate and visible, while the cost of standing still stays diffuse, spread across every working day.

Standing still costs nothing on paper. It costs production time, month after month, in a sector where scanners and portals keep multiplying.

FAQ

Can a small laboratory of 2 to 5 people really afford this project?

Yes, provided it is cut into steps rather than changed all at once. The per-case tapering rate and the free trial of 100 cases over 14 days let you test without a heavy commitment before any decision.

Do you have to change CAD software to digitize impression reception?

No. The roadmap acts on what comes before design, not on the CAD tool itself. A laboratory goes on working in Exocad, or in whatever design tool is already in place.

Is production likely to slow down during the transition?

The month 3 test, run on a limited scope, exists precisely to avoid that risk. The old flow stays active in parallel until the new one has been proven on a few dentists, before any generalization.

How long does each step of this roadmap really take?

The pace suggested is indicative. A small laboratory may move faster on the stocktaking. It will take longer on the generalization, depending on the number of partner dentists and scanners already in use.

Conclusion

Going digital in a small dental laboratory does not call for a large IT project. It fits into six progressive steps: taking stock, prioritizing, a limited test, generalization, compliance, then measuring the result.

Each month stays reversible. Nothing stops you from halting after the month 3 test if the time gained is not confirmed on the laboratory's real cases.

To start the month 1 stocktaking with a flow already running, see the DigiLab features. They set out compatibility with your dentists' scanners. Try DigiLab free on 100 cases over 14 days, no commitment, before looking at the pricing page and its per-case tapering rate.

The Digilab team