Freudenberg Medicalhas expanded its Baldwin Park, California operations by adding six injection molding machines including three new Arburg molding machines, a work cell for two-shot molding, and a Wittmann Battenfeld micro-molding machine with in-process visual inspection capability. The machines range from 15-ton to 110-ton.
“These added machines will support component production for in-vitro diagnostic test kits for our international customers,” says Sven Rosenbeiger, vice president and general manager GBU Thermoplastics. https://www.freudenbergmedical.com
Appointments, promotions, new hires
Star Cutter Co. has promoted Bradley Cooper to service manager at its Elk Rapids, Michigan location, overseeing the Star brand CNC tool and cutter grinders. Cooper will be responsible for managing and developing service group offerings; enhancing customer communication, order processing procedures, and project management; and supervising the service team. https://www.starcutter.com
Bradley Cooper
PHOTO: STARCUTTER
Cretex Companies’CEO Lynn Schuler retired Jan. 31, 2021, and Jeff Wollerman, president and COO of Cretex Cos. will succeed Schuler as CEO. Schuler was with Cretex Cos. for 36 years and held numerous leadership positions, including six years as a business unit president and two years as Cretex Cos. CFO. Schuler was elected president in 2007, and CEO in 2008. https://www.cretex.com
Jeff Wollerman
PHOTO: CRETEX.COM
MiQ Partners has hired Olaf Tessarzyk as CEO to help lead the company through a new era of market expansion and growth. Tessarzyk has years of experience leading manufacturing companies to higher profitability by streamlining operational efficiencies, executing product launches, and leading sales and partnership activities. https://www.miqpartners.com
You’ve likely been reading about the continued high levels of activity in medtech mergers & acquisitions (M&A) in 2021. A week rarely goes by without an acquisition announcement or two.
Since the pandemic, there’s been a lot of discussion regarding whether this is a good time to sell a medtech company. While every business situation is unique, there’s no doubt this is a great time to consider options. Some possible scenarios:
1. Early-stage companies: Whether you have revenue or not, if you’re an early stage company that has proven you have a scalable model, it might be the right time to consider a partnership with a strategic industry player. Being considered scalable could include any of the following:
Proven revenue model which demonstrates salability of products
Major market regulatory clearance (FDA, CE, China, or Japan)
Clinical evidence demonstrating efficacy of your products and a clinical use case that validates usability/ acceptance by clinical end-users
Reimbursement model to drive adoption in a major market country
There haven’t been many better times for early-stage companies to explore strategic options. Many industry strategics and smaller companies that have seen their products in high demand are flush with cash due to the pandemic and are looking to invest in their portfolio. Others are seeking strategic innovation to differentiate themselves going forward. Either way, these companies are looking for you.
2. Middle market medtech* company owner who wants to continue to control the company and take money off the table
Sell a minority stake in the company
Sell a majority stake
Private equity (PE) companies have so much dry powder (funds available to spend) that they are getting more creative in finding ways to invest. They’re more open than ever to deals where they invest in the current management (as a minority or majority owner) without necessarily taking control of the company. An owner can get an investment and still run the company (within certain mutually agreed parameters), and the owner can retire some initial risk and move some of the equity into liquid funds.
3. Middle market medtech* company owner who wants to sell and move on:
Sell a majority of the company
Sell the entire company
Similar to the discussion for item 2, this is a great time for any medtech company owner interested in selling their company to explore options to best maximize their value as they seek to either retire or move on to another business opportunity.
Whether you’re an early-stage company or a middle market company seeking to sell all (or a portion of) your company, it’s a great time to evaluate your next steps to maximize your value moving forward. The best first step is to speak with an industry M&A professional, make a strategic plan, and then execute to deliver value to you and your fellow stakeholders.
About the authors: CEO Florence Joffroy-Black is a long-time MedTech M&A and marketing expert. She can be reached at florencejblack@medworldadvisors.com. Managing Director Dave Sheppard is a former medical OEM Fortune 500 executive and an experienced MedTech M&A professional. He can be reached at davesheppard@medworldadvisors.com.
*A middle market company is typically a company with revenue between $5 million and $200 million.
SCARA robots automate medical syringe manufacturing
When a large medical device original equipment manufacturer (OEM) needed to automate coating plastic syringes for medical diagnostics, including a COVID-19 application, it turned to NuTec Tooling Systems.
NuTec employed four Epson G6 Cleanroom SCARA robots into its syringe coating machine. The automated process gave the plastic syringe a glass-like finish and enabled feasible mass production. Ease of use and application versatility within the Epson RC+ development environment, plus an ISO-3 rating and compliance with cleanroom standards, makes the robots ideal for this project.
A global provider of precision motor spindle support and repair based near Charlotte, North Carolina, Precision Drive Systems (PDS) celebrates 25 years in business.
Founded in 1996 as the exclusive North American sales and service center of Giordano Colombo spindles, PDS serves U.S. customers from its service center in Bessemer City; European customers from its repair facility in Lohne, Germany; and has technical service partners worldwide.
“Over our 25-year history, our talented team of engineers and technicians has collectively saved our customers millions of dollars with spindle-root-cause failure reports, spindle repairs, and rebuilds,” says PDS CEO Allen Turk.
Demand for sensors to monitor the critical health of machines is rising, due in large part to the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and factory automation.
Reliable, intelligent sensors are the backbone of predictive maintenance. By capturing critical performance data – changes in temperature, vibrations, position, pressure – manufacturers gain a better understanding about the condition of their machines, reducing potential risk. Real-time information allows them to see trends and quickly react to avoid failures that could lead to costly, disruptive downtime and wasted labor.
As factories transform digitally and autonomously, demand for these devices is vastly growing to prevent these issues and enable proactive maintenance. Along with that demand is the increasing expectation that sensors will be fast, accurate, and durable, as more factories seek continuous production and efficiency.
Next-generation, data-driven solution
The need to capture multiple types of measurement in extremely small packages is pushing the development of multi-sensing elements, including TE Connectivity’s 830M1 embedded piezoelectric (PE) triaxial accelerometer. The advanced, embedded device senses acceleration to monitor machine health where wide bandwidth, small size, low power, and robust performance are essential. The accelerometer’s superior resolution provides a reliable solution for long-term, stable, and accurate performance for industrial condition monitoring applications in harsh environments. Its fully hermetic, leadless chip carrier (LCC) package allows the printed circuit board (PCB)-mountable sensor to measure acceleration in X, Y, and Z in a single package, rather than three, reducing the envelope and lowering costs.
“These sensors give you an endless amount of data, which not only helps the factory run 24/7 but improves the efficiency of the machinery because you can continually adjust the parameters,” says Bjorn Ryden, director of product management at TE. “It increases productivity by minimizing downtime and it helps address workplace safety.”
During development, TE focused on key parameters and design components to ease continuous condition monitoring, providing information to guide better decision making to operate in harsh environments. The central technology element in the 830M1 is the internal PE sensing technology, offering superior frequency response, measurement resolution, long-term stability, and minimal long-term drift. PE requires no power, and signal conditioning (charge to voltage conversion) can be provided within a device with very low current requirement.
“This is a proven, reliable technology,” Ryden says. “The key benefit is the wide bandwidth or frequency response. It also has superior measurement resolution as the 830M1 offers up to 15kHz bandwidth of frequency response. Together with a measurement resolution, that enables the end user to ascertain very early failure modes in high-speed applications.”
The earlier the shop-floor worker can detect a problem, the less expensive the repair solution is going to be.
Future sensor technology
Ryden predicts that Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT)-enabled factories will continue to be the main driving force for sensor adoption and capabilities, making devices more accurate and robust. As a result, manufacturers will achieve improved quality, visibility, and control of their production.
Advances in sensor technologies will also continue to make predictive maintenance more feasible and affordable. Easier installation, miniaturization, and wireless sensing will drive costs down in the future. As the factory floor becomes more connected, additional pieces of equipment and applications will require multiple sensors in a small footprint. This will push further sensor miniaturization while also lowering power requirements. In addition, machinists will rely more on wireless solutions for retrofitting existing equipment and achieving a high return on investment (ROI).
Another evident trend is increased sensor fusion. This includes using multi-sensor integration and having everything connected on the factory floor to capture multiple types of measurements, creating strong, reliable data output.
“The 830M1 really is a combo sensor. It is a triaxial vibration sensor, but it also has an internal resistance temperature detector (RTD) that offers a temperature output,” Ryden adds. “The end user has the option to read both temperature and vibration from that sensor.”
As IIoT becomes more secure, improving the safe transfer of critical data, sensor fusion should accelerate. In turn, this will enhance remote operating capabilities.
There’s also a growing need for smarter sensors to process and interpret large quantities of data. This space is evolving as we move into a more connected world.
Implementing intelligence and machine learning on the sensors is only in the early stages, but Ryden expects to see shifts as industry enters the next phase of the evolution of IIoT factories.
“We consider ourselves vital to addressing this market and the evolving market for sensor fusion and artificial intelligence (AI),” Ryden says. “And we will continue to partner with our customers and work together with ecosystem partners to solve these challenges and develop our next generation of sensors that we can then tailor to these needs.”
About the author: Michelle Jacobson is the assistant editor of TMD. She can be reached at mjacobson@gie.net or 216.393.0323.
8 growth areas in life sciences, healthcare in 2021
Departments - Medical Infographic
A recent report from Frost & Sullivan highlights market sectors that grew faster than expected in 2020, accelerating several trends and exposing shifting opportunities.
Posted by Elizabeth Engler Modic
