Device network, AusBiotech join forces

The Medical Device Network (MDN) has joining forces with peak body AusBiotech to officially become a program of the industry organisation.

MDN steering committee chairman Dr Derrick Beech said that lobbying by AusBiotech had led the government to include medical devices as a part of the biotechnology sector. "We hope that by joining with AusBiotech, we can give greater weight to the medical devices industry," he said.

AusBiotech executive director Dr Tony Coulepis said the alliance was a significant event for the Australian biotechnology industry.

"The development of this program indicates a significant opportunity to build relationships and information-sharing between sectors," he said.

Coulepis said that he believed the medical devices sector was highly under-rated and the alliance would help to raise the profile of the industry.

According to Robert Mitchell, general manager of the Warren Centre for Advanced Engineering at the University of Sydney, the MDN grew out of the realisation that the medical devices industry lacked the connections between different people and organisations in the sector.

Despite this, there have been two outstanding examples - Cochlear and ResMed - of Australian companies in the world class in the medical devices industry, Mitchell said.

Over the last 18 months, the Warren Centre has developed the MDN within the medical devices sector, now numbering more than 550 informal members.

"The over-arching objective is to facilitate the commercial development of an Australian medical devices industry," said Mitchell.

The organisation aims to improve the success rate of medical device start-up companies and to foster advances in R&D as well as manufacturing. In addition, the MDN will provide a voice to government and the community for the sector and will promote achievements in the industry.

It also plans to have an educational role, providing commercial training to the sector.

The official launch of the MDN will be held in Sydney on 25 June 2002.