According to the Department of Commerce, the U.S medical device industry is expected to grow nearly 21 percent to $133 billion by 2016. Collaborations have led to record advances in neuro-stimulators, stent technologies, biomarkers, robotic assistance, and electronic device implants.
Southern Research Institute www.southernresearch.org and the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB), www.uabmedicine.org are collaborating to develop new medical devices in this growth industry.
The strategic partnership called the “Alliance for Innovative Medical Technology” (AIMTech) www.southernresearch.org/life-sciences/alliance-innovative-medical-technology combines the research expertise of the Southern Research Institute scientists and engineers, UAB biomedical engineers, and clinicians.
The idea for the new alliance arose from discussions between Art Tipton, PhD, President and CEO of Southern Research Institute, and Timothy Wick, PhD, Chair of the UAB Department of Biomedical Engineering www.uav.edu/engineering/home/departments-research/bme.
“Partnering with UAB allows us to accelerate commercialization of medical technologies, improve healthcare delivery and outcomes, and generate economic development and growth,” said Tipton. “This is also an opportunity to develop a lucrative business unit that will potentially create a number of new companies and jobs within the rapidly growing biomedical engineering industry.”
Both organizations will use a patient-centric approach to develop medical technology in cardiology, orthopedics, ophthalmology, rehabilitation engineering, and trauma. The goal is to create medical devices across all five specializations. The plan is for the first group of AIMTech-created medical devices to hit the market by 2020.
AIMTech will invent new medical devices, help raise venture capital, establish small medical device companies, manage the clinical trial, and deal with the FDA approval processes. Major medical device companies will manufacture and sell the devices. AIMTech will gain a return on investment through research grants, licensing, royalty fees, and equity arrangements.
“Our partnership is already a tremendous success,” said UAB President Ray L. Watts, M.D. “We have approximately 18 new disease-changing therapies in the Alabama Drug Discovery Alliance (ADDA) pipeline. We’re pushing hard to bring them to market as new treatments as rapidly as possible. We envision a similar impact with the AIMTech collaboration.”