The doors closed yesterday on the Med-Tech Innovation Expo 2019, which took place for the first time at its new home the NEC, Birmingham. This year’s expo contained some exciting new features, including a third conference stage signalling significant growth for this sector-leading event.
The Introducing Stage, was a new forum for exhibitors to meet with delegates and demonstrate their technologies first-hand. Also new to the show floor was the Acceleration Zone, a forum for taking new ideas and organisations to the next level. Other additions included two new conference sessions: a global perspectives session as well as a panel discussion on the role of women in engineering.
Med-Tech Innovation Expo is the UK’s only dedicated, standalone exhibition for medical device engineering and manufacturing. The event was complemented by the Med-Tech Innovation Conference organised in partnership with Medilink UK, as well as the Medilink UK Healthcare Business Awards.
This year saw an expansion of the show floor to accommodate a record number of exhibitors nearing 300 from 14 countries. Initial data shows that this dynamic event connected almost 3,000 attendees across the two days from 34 different countries, with an exciting and diverse range of businesses, on hand to help them solve their medical design and manufacturing challenges.
“Med-Tech gives us the opportunity to show and discuss the types of services that Boddingtons Plastics can offer to our customers. We’ve seen really good footfall and had several new leads for new devices. The show has been a great success for us and in fact we’ve booked for next year already.” Chris Philpott, Business Development Manager, Boddingtons Plastics Ltd
The event is fast becoming Europe’s go-to show for product launches, with a raft of companies bringing new and futuristic engineering solutions for healthcare OEMs and medtech start-ups to examine.
Lohmann Technologies demonstrated how they are moving with the times. The evolution of modern textiles has increased rapidly over the last 30 years and these fabrics have new applications in the medical world, with the group demonstrating how textile bonding has evolved in the sector.
Faulhaber raised the bar and showed their innovative winding technology and optimised design with the introduction of the Faulhaber BXT family of flat brushless DC motors presented, at Med-Tech Innovation Expo, for the very first time in the UK.
In all, more than 50 engaging and inspiring presentations took place across three stages, along with a wealth of exciting and educational show features. Visitors saw presentations from a wide range of major OEMs, government officials and industry experts. On the Conference Stage, attendees heard presentations from speakers including Mark McIntyre, Boston Scientific; Nicola Blackwood, Department of Health and Social Care; and Chris Hudson from Roche Diagnostics.
On the HealthTech Stage speakers included, Oli Hudson from Wilmington Healthcare; Dr Lydia Yarlott from Forward; and Dr Iain Hennessey, NHS England.
Meanwhile, event exhibitors shared technical know-how on the Introducing Stage: speakers included Dr Grace Jennings from NICE Scientific Advice, Ewan Grist, Chris de Mauny and Toby Bond from Bird & Bird and a global perspectives session moderated and sponsored by Marks & Clerk LLP.
“It was actually a great pleasure to be invited to the Med-Tech Expo meeting. I spoke on the Introducing Stage, which I must say was a packed audience. We had a great stream of people coming up to the stand to talk to us after.” Tom Clutton-Brock, Clinical Director, MD-TEC.
In addition to the packed conference and seminar programme, visitors experienced a range of exciting show features. The Medilink UK Pavilion featured a range of Medilink member businesses, including Loughborough University, Piota and White Horse Plastics, an excellent platform to highlight their solutions to industry challenges.
“It’s a good mix of exhibitors, we came to speak to a couple of clients and the conversations turned out very fruitful.” Robert Johnston, Injection Mould Tooling Expert, GSK
“Great day at MedTechExpo, interesting presentations and conversations with exhibitors & visitors. Will definitely be back next year!” Emmanuelle Jeannot, Owner, Medical Translator
Duncan Wood, Chief Executive of Rapid News Group, owners of Med-Tech Innovation Expo commented, “We are delighted with another significant step forward for this event as we work to create a defining event experience for the UK medtech sector. The two days contained many
highlights, new products, new companies, world-class presentations and stunning applications. Whilst as organisers we have had superb feedback, we recognise we can’t do it without industry support, so we thank all our exhibitors, speakers, sponsors and partners for their efforts; they make the show.”
MEDILINK UK HEALTHCARE BUSINESS AWARD WINNERS
At the Medilink UK Healthcare Business Awards, ten awards were presented to winners for both Medilink UK and Med-Tech Innovation categories.
Judges rewarded companies for their contributions to the medtech and life science industry. The full list of finalists and winners can be found here.
