Hole in one: Med in Ireland's Dublin return
2019 may well be remembered as a brilliant year for Irish golf, but it’s also the year that Med In Ireland returns to Dublin.
More than 800 executives from the global medical technology and healthcare sectors will attend the one-day event this October.
Once again it’s invite-only, but open to expressions of interest, and includes a full day’s conference with presentations from top executives and key opinion leaders from around the world. It provides an opportunity for international visitors to experience the future of medtech, in a country acknowledged as a global medtech hub.
For many visitors, the primary attraction is the chance to participate in a tailored programme of visits to some of Ireland’s most innovative medtech and healthcare companies, organised by Enterprise Ireland, the trade and innovation agency, for introductions to potential research, innovation and manufacturing partners.
Med in Ireland is a unique opportunity to meet with Ireland’s existing and emerging leaders across medical devices, diagnostics and digital health, as well as its world-class component part engineers and manufacturers.
It provides a chance for visitors to experience at first hand Ireland’s highly innovative medtech sector and to understand how a small country on the western periphery of Europe is producing so many groundbreaking medtech companies.
The future of medtech is emerging from a unique ecosystem
In a rapidly growing market, a glimpse into the future of medtech is invaluable.
Medtech sales worldwide are forecast to reach €530 billion by 2024. It’s the most innovative sector in Europe, resulting in 13,795 patents filed with the European Patent Office. Digital health alone is forecast to have sales of €15.7 billion by 2024.
Irish companies will make a significant contribution to this growth, helping to define the future of healthcare globally. The country hosts almost 300 homegrown medtech businesses supported by IDA Ireland and Enterprise Ireland, the biggest seed investor of start-ups in Europe.
In addition to established companies, Ireland has a vibrant medtech start-up ecosystem. These young companies are among the world’s best in terms of new technology, processes and services.
Supporting medtech start-ups
The commercialisation agenda is very important to Enterprise Ireland’s support of medtech start-ups. It is the leading agency for the commercialisation of research out of third-level institutions and its Commercialisation Fund gives innovative teams in academic institutions and clinical communities funding to validate the technical and commercial viability of ideas and products supporting the creation of new technology start-ups.
Enterprise Ireland co-funds Bioinnovate Ireland, a national programme that supports innovation and “design thinking” in the medtech sector. A significant number of alumni Bioinnovate Fellows of the have been successful in creating new high potential start-ups from research in recent years. The agency also supports Health Innovation Hub Ireland, a government-backed collaboration between business and the Irish healthcare system.
Ireland’s medtech ecosystem is further supported by bodies such as BioExel, the country’s medtech accelerator; Irish Manufacturing Research (IMR) Technology Centre an independent not-for-profit research organisation, funded by Enterprise Ireland and IDA Ireland, which provides applied research solutions and advanced manufacturing expertise, technology transfer and training to the country’s manufacturing sector, and CeADAR, a market-focused technology centre for innovation and applied research in AI, machine learning and data analytics across.
Innovation is Ireland’s medtech differentiator
Ireland’s geography helps too. It is a strategic location of choice, not only for global medtech, but also as a base for companies looking to tap into the second biggest global medtech market, Europe, which accounts for 27% of the world market, at €115 billion.
“Med in Ireland is an opportunity for us to fly in top international customers from around the world, so that they can see the medtech industry we have in Ireland, and for Enterprise Ireland’s client companies to do business across diagnostics, medical devices, digital health and the subsupply of precision engineering and component manufacturing,” says Deirdre Glenn, director of life sciences at Enterprise Ireland (pictured).
It’s also an opportunity for Ireland’s medtech sector to show what sets it apart – innovation.
“The differentiator for Irish medtech is not just about being top quality and price sensitive, because those things are a given in medtech, it’s about the fact that Ireland is highly innovative,” she says.
Ireland, already a trusted advanced manufacturing base, succeeds by helping its clients solve their problems through innovation. “The Irish medtech sector acts as strategic partners rather than just suppliers to each of their customers,” says Glenn.
How Enterprise Ireland helps
“Med in Ireland is not just about showcasing the most innovative of our companies. It’s also about showing the supports we have here in Ireland, designed to support companies in their innovation agenda and in their competitiveness agenda. Enterprise Ireland helps companies to access clinicians, academics and researchers, plugging them into the very highly integrated ecosystem we have here.”
Healthcare costs are spiralling globally, she acknowledges, pointing out that Irish medtech companies succeed by helping their clients to regain control. They lead the way in relation to value-based healthcare by helping, not just to design innovative solutions, but by also clearly articulating the ultimate impact of their products and services in terms of savings.
“Irish medtech companies are working on a collaborative basis, listening to clients’ needs and developing products and services to suit. It is market-led, customer-led, innovation,” says Glenn.
The funding Enterprise Ireland makes available to support its medtech sector is a unique enabler of this.
“Certainly there is more available to companies here in terms of supporting their research, development and innovation than elsewhere. It’s why Ireland is considered an emerging global hub for medtech in terms of the whole innovation agenda,” says Glenn.
The importance of innovation for Ireland cannot be overstated, she says: “We are a tiny nation which punches way above its weight in medtech. We know that to compete globally, we need to innovate. That we succeed in this is proven time and again by the best in class companies we have that are selling all over the world.”
Med in Ireland takes place at Dublin’s RDS on Thursday 19th October, 2019.