R&D Med Device Innovations Takeaway

Part of Gerson Lehrman Group, Inc.
Top Takeaways:
Best Practices in R&D for Medical Device Innovation:
A Cross Industry Perspective
Gerson Lehrman Group, Inc. convened senior R&D executives from several industries to share their perspectives on innovation with medical device executives and investors. The hosts were Carlos Barroso, former SVP of R&D for PepsiCo Global Foods; David Croslin, former chief technologist for Hewlett-Packard; and Ramesh Rengarajan, former CTO of GE Water.
1. "If you centralize you'll be more efficient but you won't be very innovative." - Carlos BarrosoCompanies have to strike a balance between decentralizing R&D operations and having them close enough to capitalize on the ideas that emerge. At PepsiCo, there were about six global innovation centers with satellite branches. Barroso stressed the importance of international R&D. "It continues to amaze me how many U.S. companies think that 95% of the brainpower is contained within 5% of the world's population."
2. "You have to look at the limiting challenges that you have and assume that they are no longer valid." - David CroslinAlong with tablets, smartphones are emerging as a new gateway for media consumption. "Consumers are very cognizant and want high quality screens, because they're using their phones to look at pictures, video, YouTube. A lot of phones now have the capability of doing HD recording and with all that, being connected all the time, anywhere, continues to be even more important to even just the average consumer." That means a different set of features is rising to prominence: Screen quality is more important than ever, and Internet connection speed will be a key feature.
Another trap Croslin cited is tailoring products to the needs of your biggest customers. It's essential to talk to companies who aren't your customers. They'll tell you why your products aren't good enough.
3. "Never trust a single point of information." - Ramesh Rengarajan"Try to send multiple groups to multiple locations to collect data from multiple clients, then bring it in and validate," Rengarajan said. Collecting customer data from multiple streams enables companies to see what the customer really wants and how many different applications a product can have. "You may not jump into all of them immediately but keep that list."
4. Look for "unarticulated needs.""People don't know they want a potato chip that tastes fresher because they've never had one," Barroso said. "They don't know to ask for that."
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5. Get close to the ground.Croslin cited a friend who's an emergency trauma nurse and is full of ideas for product improvements. Why aren't those improvements on the market? Vendors probably haven't asked the nurse, Croslin said.
6. Consider open innovation.Collaborating with entities outside an organization can have huge advantages, Rengarajan said. Firstly, a venture capital or private equity firm has often made a big investment. "Big corporations can leverage someone else's money to take a product out," he said. Additionally, collaborators can reduce costs and cut down on time to market.
Croslin said there can be advantages to open innovation but on balance he was less enthusiastic: "If you don't own the intellectual property you don't own the market." In some cases open innovation ensures that products arrive at market as commodities with "no growth potential and no competitive differentiation."
7. Reach out to regulators.Regulators can be more open to innovative technologies than in the past, Rengarajan said. "Be extremely transparent, be proactive, give them more information than they'll ever need and more," he continued. "Invite them, share with them and keep very transparent records. When you do this you get instant credibility and confidence."
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