At last month’s 2009 AusMedtech Conference held in Sydney, design for manufacture emerged as a critical part of the DNA of successful Australian medical technology companies.
Speaking to an audience of over 100 players in the Australian medical industry, ARRK ANZ, Cogentum and Invetech provided a compelling case for the adoption of Design for Manufacture by medical technology firms.
A recent qualitative study companies’ medical devices, conducted by Cogentum, reveals that Design for Manufacture is a well known process in the industry, however the adoption and practice of the methodology differs greatly.
Travis Hardy Manufacturing and Tooling Manager at ARRK said “Design for manufacture provides a very real and tangible process by which Australian Medical Technology companies can redress this issue. When coupled with the ability to move from lab bench to prototyping quickly and cheaply using the latest rapid prototyping technologies, Australian Medical technology firms are well placed to shorten their time to market and deliver better margins”.
The interactive session at the conference acknowledged some of the important issues facing the industry and discussed the challenges that companies can meet when commercialising technology and taking it to the global market.
Travis Hardy from ARRK and David James from Invetech illustrated the power of the Design for manufacture process and how and where it mitigates much of the development risk that many medical technology company’s face.
It is ever more apparent that the rigour and structure provided by Design for Manufacture not only reduces development risk, but also had a straight to the bottom line impact on the performance of these emerging businesses.
Summarizing the 2.5 hours session, Hardy commented, “In any economic environment, and especially the current one, investors are seeking reassurance that all value that can be captured is directed to the bottom line. Design for Manufacture provides not only management teams, but investors with the assurance that the technology can be manufactured at the optimal cost and with the true margin flowing straight back to the company.