5 Imperatives for MedTech Companies to Unlock the Value of Digital Innovation

Medtech companies are expected to play a key role in the digital transformation of healthcare. Many are already prioritizing building digital capabilities in-house via investing in R&D, business models, and acquiring assets to expand their digital offerings across therapy areas. At Cetas Healthcare, we regularly collaborate with many MedTech leaders on exciting and complex projects to gather robust, high-quality, and actionable market insights to inform on their Digital Innovation opportunities. Here are the top 5 imperatives that MedTech companies should consider to be able to unlock the value of digital innovation!

#1. Focus on the Patient Care Pathway

Digital technology opens new opportunities for MedTech companies along the entire patient care pathway – from screening to diagnosis to treatment and follow-up monitoring. Capitalizing on those opportunities depends on fully understanding the patient journey, key challenges, and pain points of different healthcare constituents (patients, physicians, hospital administrators, payers, etc.). For example, AI-based solutions help flag patients (that are at high-risk) for screening to help with early detection; virtual navigators can help address patient questions post-diagnosis; and digital platforms can be used to send notifications to patients regarding treatment plans, schedules, medication intake, etc. to increase patient involvement in their care.

#2. Shift from physical to digital product innovation

Digital product innovation calls for agile ways of working, driven by the fast-changing digital world. Iterative product concept testing approaches such as Online Bulletin Boards or In-depth Interviews can help make quick “pivot or persevere” decisions, based on direct customer feedback. These iterative testing methods allow MedTech leaders to “observe” customer feedback in real-time (or near real-time) and may include multiple rounds of testing (including a quantitative validation) either a masked prototype of a new product, an idea, or even a workflow to see how these ideas will do in the market. To learn more, here’s our Radiology Analytics Concept Testing Case Study

#3. Embracing New Pricing Models

In the new digital world, MedTech companies need to rethink their pricing strategies and implement innovative pricing models, such as pay-per-use, subscriptions, or freemium pricing. Also, digital products need to be priced according to their value and customer willingness to pay. As a result, it is critical to understand and analyze the benefit variables customers are willing to pay for. In addition, over the past few years, there has been a shift from products to platforms that act as intermediaries to connect different parties in an ecosystem. To be successful, pricing approaches need to be designed in such a way that allows companies to reach critical mass to drive the overall value of the platform. Read our Value PACS Study to know more.

#4. Stronger Value Propositions

Digital capabilities could be a way to differentiate in the market, but MedTech companies need to demonstrate the impact of their products and services and keep key success criteria in mind (such as accessibility, interoperability, cybersecurity, etc.) to deliver on customer value. Value Prop testing is a critical step in product innovation as it helps validate assumptions about target customers, their needs and how products can solve them and keep in mind that there may be different value propositions that meet the needs of different target personas, especially with IT personas playing a major role in the purchasing process of digital solutions.

#5. Ecosystem of Industry Players and Partners

The proliferation of tools and players in the digital health space makes it exciting and full of potential. Identifying, evaluating, and monitoring competing, adjacent, or emerging technologies in different target therapy areas is one of the important responsibilities of Strategy and Upstream leaders at MedTech companies to be able to identify partners, remove potential blind spots and leverage future opportunities.

So, these are the 5 imperatives that MedTech companies should consider. If you want to have a discussion on any of these topics, feel free to contact us. And, do let us know your thoughts as well.

Cetas Healthcare is one of the largest MedTech market research firms in the world and has worked with MedTech leaders on many primary research studies, mapping out patient care pathways across therapy areas and flagging unmet needs that can be addressed by medical technology and digital innovation.