The end of 2021 is right around the corner, and it’s expected to look ahead to the near future of the medical devices industry. Specifically in the last couple of years, mainly as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, we’ve seen changes, disruptions and  some advances in healthcare and life sciences product development, as we’ve never seen before.

So, after such a challenging time, what can developers, designers, and manufacturers of healthcare technologies look forward to, while the world is entering a new phase of recovery from a global pandemic? We collected some of the top changes, trends and opportunities in medical devices, which you should keep an eye on.

Managing global supply chain challenges

It’s not surprising that global supply chain shortages top the list. The covid has affected global shortage in nearly every industry –  raw materials, electronic components and finished goods. Forecasts say the backlog of demand is likely to take us through 2022 and into 2023. In addition, transportation of products around the globe has been slowing down significantly, mainly sea and air shipments.

In this environment, proactive supply chain solutions will be a top priority for medical device manufacturers. Planning around severely extended lead times, identifying replacement parts, even redesigning products to accommodate for supply availability—all of this requires better visibility and agility, and the suppliers that can provide this will be winning the game.

Thinking about the supply chain from the earliest moments, leveraging predictive analytics, and relying on the relationships with a global supply chain partner will be some of the most important decisions medical devices companies make this year.

The rise of Telemedicine

Telemedicine has been available for many years, however, in the last two years it exploded. The people’s need to stay at home during Covid 19 quarantine, the fear of going to hospitals, the constraints on flights and transportation in general are all encouraging the usage of telemedicine as a viable and effective method for patient’s medical care.

Healthcare institutions are using it more than ever before. During Covid 19 telemedicine helped to preserve personal protective equipment during a worldwide shortage, protect healthcare workers from being infected, and allowed the monitoring of patients’ chronic conditions without putting them at risk by attending medical settings

Home-use-devices

Like in Telemedicine, the stay-at-home trend encourages more and more companies to adapt technologies which were once found only in hospitals, labs and professional clinics, to the consumer market. This involves miniaturization of components, adopting different business models and changes in regulation, but the trend cannot be stopped, and is relevant mainly in aesthetic devices, diagnostics, and even therapy

One example for the telemedicine and home use-devices revolution is ultrasound diagnostics, a technology used mainly by physicians in hospitals and clinics : In the last 2 years PulseNmore, a company from Israel, has developed, together with Taga, at-home-use ultrasound device that allows pregnant women to perform an ultrasound scan on their fetuses using only their smartphones and send the results directly to their physician. The PulseNmore product has been launched recently and is highly successful among healthcare service providers and their patients.

Innovation in point-of-care diagnostic devices

Diagnostics at the point-of-care is booming as healthcare organizations wish to shorten the diagnostics process – instead of sending the patient to the hospital or taking a test sample and sending it to the lab for a few days, many diagnostic devices are targeting the physician’s  clinic or the nurses point-of-care and providing reliable results within minutes.

The pandemic emphasized how important this trend is.

One example is B-Matrix from Picodya, an award-winning lab-in-a-box for blood tests which was designed by Taga. B-Matrix can be positioned in every point-of-care, can handle multiple blood samples and test different indications, saving time and money for both the health institute and the patient.

The return of elective procedures

Elective surgeries can include cosmetic procedures like removing a mole or a wart. But they can also include more serious conditions like hernia. During the COVID-19 pandemic, elective surgeries were put on hold and with them, the demand for the medical equipment used in those procedures was stopped. Now those elective procedures are starting to recover, and many procedure-dependent companies are finding themselves in the spotlight again, for medical device manufacturers, these are very good news, meaning ramping back up to meet the rising demand.

On growing integration of artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and IoT

According to a report by Grand View Research, the market for AI healthcare is expected to upsize from $10.4 billion in 2021 to $120.2 billion by 2028. A significant driver of the growth will come from medical technologies such as advanced diagnostics and robotic-assisted surgery. If you figure out a way to integrate advanced computing into your existing or planned products, you can find a great opportunity in these fields.

Naturally, with the AI technologies comes the increased need for cybersecurity in medical devices. The issue of cyber security has two sides that need to work with each other in harmony. First, the product development and manufacturing side—how the partner controls and protects the customer’s information. Then there’s the security of connected products against cyber threats when they’re in use out in the medical market. Healthcare companies will need to make sure that they’re working with partners who understand and are proactively prepared for the cybersecurity needs of the medical device industry.

No matter the medical device trends you’re focused on, the key to success will be to cultivate partnerships, smart outsourcing in the early design and development stages, manufacturing and support after your products goes out to the market—all of the above will add the expertise, capabilities and capacity to move faster and enter the market more competitively.

Taga was founded in 2002 as a design and engineering firm and over the years grew and added related services as well as new skills, methodologies and knowledge. After almost 20 years of activity we wanted to create a fresh corporate identity which represents better our believes and value proposition.

First, we asked ourselves WHY we do what we do. Why do we exist? We realized that what connects us to our work and to each other is that we just love to see how a product starts as a dream in someone’s mind and becomes a eventually a reality: manufactured and shipped to customers, used on a regular basis, solves a problem, answers a need. Moreover, we love to see how our customer’s dream product beats the competition, creates a disruption in its category or even changes people’s lives.

We figured out that in many cases Taga was a major vehicle in this process, helping our customers to fulfill their dreams and creating a real breakthrough in their market. Hence our new tag line: Dreams Taking Shape

Second, we wanted to explain HOW we fulfill these dreams.
We do that by taking an holistic approach, not just a designer’s point of view. We look at an idea in its inception and we try to see the end. We imagine the product in the customer hands, , we figure out the usage scenarios we see it on the production line, the cost, the dimensions, the weight, the logistics and the maintenance, we analyze all the risks involved with the product from the very early stages, always thinking what can go wrong, which issues should we solve and what advantages should we give the product in order to make it a winner. We combine technology with art, user experience with business, inspiration with reality. Our out-of-the-box thinking and thorough experience in wide range of aspects is how we make winning products

We tried to convey this message in our new branding. Our new logo has a more contemporary look and taking Taga from just designing and engineering products to a much rounded and comprehensive approach. Our red color was updated to a more modern orange-red, which represents our passion to design and the blue color was added to represent our realistic and cool approach to engineering and production of products.

Third, we want to describe in details WHAT we do: How we work, what exact services we provide and in which domains we excel. Our expertise in the medical market has put Taga in the forefront of the industry, providing physical and digital design services to the world’s top medical devices companies, as well as engineering and production services, and we wanted to convey that message. Our knowledge in consumer electronics and in professional equipment is another aspect we wanted to emphasize and the fact that the products we make are winners, both business wise as well as in design and innovation competitions.

Our new website presents 60 cases studies of projects which show in details how Taga work and the story behind the products, as well as more than 100 products that are shown as additional examples of our experience and scope. Our services are explained in details as well the 70 awards we won and customers we worked with

We are proud to launch our new website and our new corporate identity, which was built together with the branding agency 3 Bears

The Covid 19 has changed our lives in many ways, one of them is the increased usage of medical home-use devices.

We have numerous clients in the medical device field which shifted their efforts towards consumer devices, however taking part in designing and the development the PulseNmore product was extra inspiring. PulseNmore almost sounds like science fiction – an ultrasound device for home-use, which connects to the smartphone, and through a special app, the video footage is seen on your phone, while the app automatically sends it directly to the physician. Sounds pretty futuristic, isn’t it?

But it’s here and available for pregnant women all over the world, and Covid 19 even accelerated the product entry to the market, resulting in a large purchase of units by Calilit HMO, which provides the device to its patients who are at high-risk pregnancy in order to allow them to be examined regularly and frequently, without having to leave home.

During the Israeli Covid 19 quarantines, this was especially useful, allowing the pregnant patient to keep herself and her fetus safe and not be exposed to infection dangers in the hospital or at the doctor’s office, while still maintaining a regular routine of ultrasound examinations, the product is disposable, intended to be used by the pregnant woman until the birth.

The PulseNmore ultrasound system packs state-of-the-art componentry and smart design into a compact device. The device is ergonomically designed to work with almost any mobile phone, enables intuitive use, and does not require technological understanding. The guideline is “plug and play” – just dock your phone and get started, there is instruction guidance that accompanies the user throughout the use, and the special application automatically sends the image.

We can’t say we’re surprised by all the media and public attention this unforgettable design and truly innovative product is getting.

Want to read more about it? See PulseNmore project page