MICRO-TECH
The Nexus of High Quality and Pricing in Endoscopy

The major challenges in the gastrointestinal (GI) industry are not centered just on innovation. Today, in flexible endoscopy and GI, the market requires manufacturers to have new-fangled products, and at the same time, reasonable prices for those products because the high prices are simply not paid by the hospitals anymore. In order to find the balance between quality products and reasonable costs, key opinion leaders also need to be continuously in contact with R&D departments that can innovate ideas for new products.

In a time when the pricing pressure in the clinical health sectors is constantly increasing, the key to success for Micro-Tech, a leading endoscopic solutions provider, lies in their ability to combine affordable prices with optimum product quality. “With the help of our R&D department, we are able to easily follow up on innovations and ideas to drive product development,” says George Harke, Senior VP of International Sales, Micro-Tech Nanjing.

Coming a long way from its outset as a Chinese company specialized in one product in endoscopy in 1999, Micro-Tech, now a stock-listed company with more than two and a half thousand employees, prides itself on providing a full line of instruments for flexible endoscopy in the GI industry. The company’s founder, one of the first Chinese entrepreneurs, is a visionary leader who decided to look beyond China’s borders in the early 2000s. This led to Micro-Tech Europe’s establishment in 2007 as the first subsidiary outside of China, opening up the opportunity for Micro-Tech to enter other markets.

The next logical strategic step was to consider more subsidiaries. In 2015, the subsidiary of Micro-Tech USA opened in Ann Arbor, Michigan, which also allowed them to have access to and feedback from the US market.

With Micro-Tech Nanjing as headquarter in China, Micro-Tech Europe and Micro-Tech USA, Micro-Tech’s R&D department boasts more than 70 engineers.

With the help of our R&D department, we are able to easily follow up on innovations and ideas to drive product development

“Today, Micro-Tech is one of the first addresses for key opinion leaders in Gastrointestinal Endoscopy, in terms of consulting for new product ideas and to make them happen,” says Harke.

Micro-Tech’s primary focus is not just the US market, which is by far the biggest individual market. In Europe, there exist a variety of healthcare systems with different development statuses, in addition to the numerous languages everywhere. By having those hubs in Europe and in the US, Micro- Tech´s Product Managers, who are fluent in the local languages, gather information from markets in all these different development stages of the healthcare systems. This information has been tremendously important for the company’s R&D department in China. They receive market information and details about product requirements and operation technologies, which helps to innovate the product portfolio according to international market needs.

Micro-Tech has been addressing one of the major demands of physicians in flexible endoscopy, which is to increase the products’ efficiency to shorten the procedure times during medical applications and make the handling of the products involved in medical examinations more effective. For instance, gastroscopies and colonoscopies typically involve a micro flexible camera that is needed to be swallowed to have the stomach examined. Very often, these examinations can lead to surgeries afterward. With the help of its R&D team, Micro-Tech has been able to work with physicians in the field of endoscopy to have more advanced instruments that would enable the physicians to perform minor procedures and operations during the endoscopy itself to avoid subsequent surgeries.

While Micro-Tech continues to specialize in GI and endoscopy, the company’s goals for the future involve entering other medical fields. The company has begun exploring even more innovative medical applications, such as OCT-3D (optical coherence tomography). “We want to continue improving ourselves in GI, but also consider introducing ourselves in other medical fields that are similar to GI in the near future,” concludes Harke.