In this autumn with cool breezes, the 6th China Medical Devices Design and Entrepreneurship Competition (Competition) Finals and Global Device Week (GDW) kicked off at Suzhou International Expo Centre on September 12! This highly anticipated event with numerous participants was open in an enthusiastic atmosphere and attracted a large number of industry elites and professionals. At the opening ceremony, several important guests delivered wonderful speeches and offered their best wishes for the success of the Competition and the GDW. Warm applause went on and on throughout the opening ceremony and participants basked in the fervor of this event.
As of today, seven finals and 10 forums have been completed and they have opened broad new perspectives on the innovative development of global medical devices for all attendees.
Opening Ceremony of the 6th China Medical Devices Design and Entrepreneurship Competition 2023 Finals and Global Device Week
In his opening remarks, Lu Yuan, a member of the Party Working Committee and Deputy Director of the Suzhou Industrial Park Administrative Committee, stated that biomedicine is an industry that the Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP) focuses on for development, which, after 16 years of cultivation, has gathered more than 2,300 related enterprises and cultivated 24 companies listed domestically or overseas, with comprehensive competitiveness ranking among the top in China, and has formed a development trend featuring a steady stream of high-quality projects, continuous optimization of the talent environment and continuous emergence of enterprise research results. In particular, in terms of medical devices, SIP has formed three advantageous areas: in vitro diagnostics, implantation and intervention equipment, and imaging equipment, with more than 600 related enterprises, including seven listed ones, and more than 1,500 medical device registration certificates obtained cumulatively. SIP has 25 products that have entered the national green channel for innovative medical device product approval, accounting for more than 40% of the province’s total, many of which are pioneering ones or filling in technical gaps in China.
As the most influential medical device competition in China, the Competition has been held in SIP for five consecutive sessions since 2018 and has attracted well-known domestic and foreign medical device innovation teams, innovation service institutions, investors and senior enterprise executives to gather to discuss the innovative development of China’s medical device industry and has infused “fresh blood” into SIP’s medical device industry. He stated that the Competition, held at the right time, is an important initiative to thoroughly implement the national innovation-driven development strategy and is believed to inject new impetus and vitality into SIP’s building of an internationally competitive medical device industry innovation cluster.
Gu Ning, a professor and doctoral supervisor at Nanjing University, stated in his speech, “I have participated in the Competition as a judge many times, and I have witnessed the Competition’s continuous improvement in its scale and quality and its full demonstration of the innovation vitality of China’s medical device industry. The medical device industry needs more innovation, especially in identifying problems from clinical needs and providing solutions to thereby promote industry development. The Competition furnishes innovative enterprises and projects in the industry with a great display platform, with the emergence of more and more promising high-quality projects. I hope that more innovative products and enterprises will closely integrate with the Competition and GDW activities in the future, to further expand the influence of the Competition.”
Jiang Wei, Deputy Director of the Jiangsu Medical Products Administration, stated that in recent years, the Jiangsu Medical Products Administration has earnestly implemented the decisions and arrangements of the CPC Jiangsu Provincial Committee, the Jiangsu Provincial People’s Government and the National Medical Products Administration, adhered to the three “bottom lines”, strived for four “first-class” achievements, deepened support and coordinated the high-level high-quality development of biomedicine. Jiangsu has significant advantages in the biomedical manufacturing industry, with the total output value of the biomedical industry accounting for about 1/6 of the country’s total, ranking first in the country for consecutive years. Jiangsu has also long been among the top in the country in terms of the number of medical device producing enterprises, the number of approved Class II and III medical devices and the number of products entering the national innovation channel.
In the first half of this year, Jiangsu ranked first in the country with 148 drugs and 200 Class III medical devices approved. The Jiangsu Medical Products Administration has been paying close attention to the Competition since its launch, and at the invitation of the host, the Jiangsu Medical Products Administration has specially commissioned its evaluation center as a co-undertaker of the Competition to strengthen collaboration and give maximum support to all participating projects, especially those to be implemented. The said evaluation center has specially sent a consulting team to provide the most direct and detailed guidance for the projects.
Jiang Feng, President of China Strategic Alliance of Medical Device Innovation, stated that the Competition, as part of “Innovation China” activities, has been successfully held for five consecutive sessions under the guidance of the related departments of the Ministry of Science and Technology; the five sessions have attracted a total of 3,119 participating projects and selected a total of 369 first-prize, second-prize and third-prize projects, which obtained total financing of nearly RMB 6.7 billion according to post-competition half-year tracking statistics; the 6th China Medical Devices Design & Entrepreneurship Competition 2023 has attracted a total of 926 participating projects, setting a new record in the number of participating projects.
He stated that the Competition’s medical innovation service platform has undergone new changes this year: an exclusive angel round investment capital and ODM platform has been established to provide more support for innovative projects. He expressed his expectation of valuable suggestions from the participants so that the Competition and GDW activities could provide precise and effective services to more audiences.
Next, Yu Liyan, Deputy Director of the SIP Science and Technology Investment Center, gave a presentation on SIP, in which he shared an overview of SIP as well as the situations of SIP’s biomedical industry, gathering of innovation resources, financial, talent and industrial policies and innovation and entrepreneurship service systems and fully presented SIP’s innovation and entrepreneurship environment to the participating guests.
Event Site
This is the sixth consecutive year that the finals of the Competition have been held in SIP, for which the SIP Administrative Committee and SIP’s Science and Technology Innovation Committee, Science and Technology Investment Center and Technology Development Co., Ltd. have given strong support once again.
The 6th China Medical Devices Design and Entrepreneurship Competition Finals and Global Device Week were successfully open amid thunderous applause. This vibrant and innovative event will continue to promote the development of the medical device industry in SIP and the Yangtze River Delta and add strong momentum to the innovative development of medical devices in the country.