Innovation Medical
Trailblazers in Medical Device Development

In the ever-changing, fast-paced medical device space, competitive advantage, and sustainability is critical to stay ahead of the competition. Particularly for startups and small-medium businesses, it is not easy to have all the expertise in house and therefore need to branch out to supplement their needs.

Medical device companies are not always founded by people with medtech experience. Even entrepreneurial healthcare professionals, who have a wealth of clinical experience at the ‘coal face’ don’t have a full grasp of how to transform their idea into a ‘real product’. They know exactly what their device needs to do and how it needs to perform, but they have limited knowledge on how to translate that into a device.

As such, they seek out a professional partner like Innovation Medical (InnovaMed), who knows how to get it done.

This is precisely where InnovaMed brings their expertise to help medical device startups and small businesses streamline product development and create excellent branding for entry into sophisticated markets. The company provides technical expertise and solutions in areas of design and development, manufacturing and technical file development.

“Product realisation can be daunting and is fraught with many risks. Our aim is to shed light on the process, mitigate as much of the risk as possible and ensure that the process is streamlined,” says Johnathon Choi, Managing Director of InnovaMed.

Before founding InnovaMed, Johnathon worked in both large established organisations as well as startups. During this time, he realised the importance of outsourcing and how it helps companies to remain focused, competitive, and agile. As he learnt that unlike big companies, small businesses mostly rely on outside expertise to bring the idea to market, he set a goal for himself to become the ‘outside expertise.’ This thought led to the cornerstone of InnovaMed.

With this strategy, today, InnovaMed is well-positioned to offer technical expertise across the entire product realisation process backed by top-notch experts, product development engineers, and manufacturing professionals. “Our multidisciplinary team, supported by its network of partners provides a platform for our clients to access a wealth of knowledge that they would otherwise have to learn and develop themselves, which can be both time consuming and costly for the business,” says Johnathon.

Working as Partners and Not Consultants

InnovaMed looks at every client as their partner. “We are not just another consultant. We are a partner on the same journey. We believe that working closely with clients to comprehend their commercial strategy and align the product realisation strategy to suit is the key to successful partnership,” asserts Johnathon.

Product realisation can be daunting and is fraught with many risks. We aim to shed light on the process, mitigate as much of the risk as possible and ensure that the process is streamlined

This is a significant part of InnovaMed’s pre-development strategy to ensure that the fundamentals of the product development activities are built on a sturdy foundation. At the same time, InnovaMed follows a modular approach to deliver services. “It means we provide expertise to areas that need supplementing. We are like a modular ‘department’ which can be integrated seamlessly by clients,” asserts Johnathon.

When it comes to client engagement, InnovaMed’s experts invest a significant amount of time in understanding the key stakeholders and mapping out the entire product journey from its inception to use and eventual disposition. This allows them to provide real solutions for the real world. According to Johnathon, “Product development and designing a medical device is more than just coming up with a nice looking device. Usability is key and it is all about understanding users and the user experience.”

A Blend of Incredible Abilities and Strong Partnerships

One of the main reasons why InnovaMed becomes the partner of choice for all medical device companies is its wide range of services. It includes everything from design, development, prototyping, testing, manufacturing, and technical documentation to meet quality and regulatory requirements. Another aspect that makes InnovaMed second to none is its strong network of partners. “Though we are small enough to be flexible and agile, our structure and the way we deliver solutions is large enough to pack a wealth of knowledge,” states Johnathon. The best part about InnovaMed is the speed at which they roll-out the product to market. It is done by offering a comprehensive range of solutions from a single access point, allowing clients to focus on the core competencies and allocate their resources and efforts to where it is needed. In the entire process, InnovaMed seamlessly integrates into the business to become an extension of the organisation, allowing for active involvement. The gap is physically bridged by being on site and working as part of an embedded team within the organisation. This form of operation sets them apart from their competitors.

With such capabilities and a highly skilled team, InnovaMed has scripted several success stories.
Johnathon cites the case of a clinician with a concept for focal therapy. The device was functional, but needed optimisation to ensure enhanced functionality and manufacturability.

We conducted a full review of the product and system requirements and looked a the current device to determine where the potential risks lay and what features could be enhanced for a safer more consistent therapy. An irrigation system was designed and retrofitted to the current device whilst maintaining the minimally invasive ‘status quo’ which was the key competitive advantage to the device. InnovaMed then shifted the attention to manufacturing aspects. “Rather than outsourcing the final assembly and manufacture of the device, we trained engineers and manufacturing personnel within the organisation to upskill them and maintain the knowledge ‘in house’. Since I first engaged the company, they have now more than tripled in size,” says Jonathan.

”Though we are small enough to be flexible and agile, our structure and the way we deliver solutions is large enough to pack a wealth of knowledge”

In another instance, InnovaMed developed a minimally invasive device for treatment of lower back pain. The project began from ‘an idea’. “Everything started from the drawing board - the surgical instrumentation, implant delivery system and the surgical technique. All aspects of the system were meticulously designed and customised. The key element to this system was the actual implant.” What was unique about the implant was that it was an in situ curing implant and, the actual implant material itself was customised and developed. InnovaMed worked strenuously with the materials development company to create a custom material, which was specific for its purpose. That material has since been issued an FDA Masterfile. This entire journey also helped the company develop multiple granted patents which forms the foundations of the company’s technology. This is an example of yet another client which has successfully navigated the product realisation pathway.

Keeping up with New Trends

In an era of big data, the emerging trends in medical technology are around wearable ‘smart’ technology. A lot of data is being utilised to improve diagnosis, improve patient care and more specifically allow targeted treatment. InnovaMed is a co-founding member of a wearable technologies company where the core technology focuses on improved patient monitoring. The smarts behind this technologies lies in the hardware for detecting the vital signals and the software for analysing the signals. The device is about to enter clinical trials.

Alongside releasing the new device, the company is currently focusing on establishing more strong partnerships to help startups’ realise their product’ quickly and effectively. In conclusion, Johnathon says, “We are in a niche area and we will continue to provide great support to companies requiring expertise in designing, developing and manufacturing devices.”