Large Medical Devices Firm
Launching a new platform to drive growth now and in the future
The medical bed industry in emerging markets is fast growing but is extremely fragmented and becoming increasingly commoditized with a proliferation of low-cost, undifferentiated products. Our client, one of the world’s leading providers of medical devices and hospital equipment. The push to commoditization posed unique challenges for our client and its high-end bed portfolio. The need to innovate was evident and strong.
Approach
We began by understanding the market from both the supply and the demand side, and met and spoke with multiple stakeholders including manufacturers, importers and distributors, hospital founders, patients, hospital staff, and doctors across geographies. We combined this data with the available secondary research such as industry and company reports and then meticulously processed and synthesized it.
We learned that the leadership of the hospitals, who were the primary customers, were aspirational and were singularly focused on delivering positive patient outcomes. Beds, while important, weren’t their top concern. They wanted the beds to be of great quality and deliver on what was necessary. Other advanced features were seen as nice to have, not must haves.
Based on these and other insights that emerged from this process, we developed over 40 ideas. Working with the client we prioritized a concept around customizable, upgradeable beds, which would allow the client to offer a lower-price entry level product but one that could be upgraded over time. Best of all, it would be more sustainable and wouldn’t require their customers to throw out existing beds in the future should they want to move on to more sophisticated beds. This would reduce waste and would be better for the environment as well. The concept was pushed forward by the client and is now entering the market.