by
Sean Ruck, Contributing Editor | October 03, 2017
From the October 2017 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine
Regardless of this, the following applies, particularly during periods of political unrest: Companies, whose international business has a wide base and can thus compensate well for temporarily declining business in certain countries, have an edge in this situation. MEDICA offers them the best opportunity to get contacts from all over the world, with its high proportions of international visitors and exhibitors. At least 4,000 exhibitors are international companies. Our visitors come to Düsseldorf from 120 nations.
HCB News: What do you estimate the mix to be between medical equipment on display versus software and apps and how has the mix changed over the course of the last few years?
JS: Anyone who’s had an eye on the tech trends and the innovations for them at MEDICA over the past few years can see that significant development is happening here. It’s not that the proportion of medical technology vs. software applications that we’re seeing presented has changed. Rather, there is a close, interdependent relationship between the two. Here, dematerialization and miniaturization are the buzzwords. Medical technology is becoming smaller and more compact, but retains its high level of efficiency and performance. It is therefore ideally suited for being used on the go, outside the traditional medical settings. At the last MEDICA, an ultrasound device was presented that consisted solely of a combination of a transducer, a smartphone and an app. This example shows that innovation in medicine is increasingly driven by developments in software, and less by hardware innovation.
Thus, the health economy is undergoing fundamental revolutionary change, similar to what is occurring in the automotive industry. This dynamic is reflected at MEDICA, both in the innovations from our thousands of exhibitors as well as in the content of the accompanying conferences and specialist forums.
Digitalization has affected all aspects of health care and such buzzwords as “networking” and “artificial intelligence” are characterizing technical discussions and are already specifically influencing product development. Any professional in the field will be able to see this change for themselves in the presentations and talks at the MEDICA Connected Healthcare Forum, the MEDICA Health IT Forum, the new products being shown by the exhibitors and the exciting MEDICA App Competition. More and more health applications for smartphones, tablets and wearables are presented here, in their specific medical context.
