3D printing can give your medtech startup a competitive edge

You need to be fast and nimble to compete. A strong maker culture enabled by 3D design and 3D printing could be the way to do it.

Derek Mathers, Worrell

[Image by MDO/WTWH art director Matt Claney]

It can be a lonely world for medical and biotechnology startup entrepreneurs during the early days. Despite their deep desire to introduce and scale novel life-extending therapies, it’s rare that these pioneers have experience designing, developing, testing or commercializing medical technologies. But this global community of risk-taking leaders give our world hope for value-based healthcare systems, where devices, drugs and biologics alike are manufactured to each patients’ anatomical and genetic makeup.

The bar has been raised for the modern medtech entrepreneur due to ever-litigious incumbent competitors, ever-cyclical regulatory scrutiny and the increasing costs of commercializing a new therapy.

How can startups even stand a chance in an industry naturally slated against them? One unique approach to creating a competitive advantage is developing products and winning approvals faster than any large company could ever hope to do, since they are structurally risk-averse and slow moving. I believe that small organizations can do this by hiring for and embedding a strong maker culture into the fabric of R&D – promoting agile hardware development, enabled by 3D design and 3D printing.

Get the full story on our sister site, Medical Design & Outsourcing.

(And see Mathers moderate a panel about 3D printing at DeviceTalks Boston on Oct. 2.)

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