The size of the medical market is expanding and evolving at a rapid pace every year. In the case of the global medical device market, the average annual growth rate has been 4.5% since 2010. It is growing at an incredibly fast pace, and as long as interest in healthy living and disease treatment continues, this trend is expected to continue.. Thanks to this phenomenon, the overall level of medical care around the world is increasing every year as various cutting-edge technologies and various medical technologies and medical devices combining them continue to emerge. span>

In the case of the domestic medical market, in addition to the skills of excellent medical staff recognized overseas, a variety of medical devices are available. By launching and exporting the product, we are focusing on expanding our influence in the global market by accelerating our overseas expansion. On the other hand, in the case of the flexible endoscope market in the domestic medical market, many domestic medical staff express disappointment as products from other countries still dominate the market. It is being done.

Mediintech is said to be focusing on research and development with a sense of mission so that domestically produced flexible endoscopes can become established in the domestic hospital market that uses foreign endoscopes I met with Lee Chi-won, CEO of MediinTech, and heard the detailed story.

Please introduce your company

MedinTech is a company established based on the core flexible endoscope technology developed by the Korea Electrotechnology Research Institute to commercialize flexible endoscopes for the digestive system. In addition to developing the world's first electric fire extinguisher flexible endoscope, our company currently uses 100% foreign endoscopes, making our domestic fire extinguisher endoscope the world's best. By providing a system that provides convenience to doctors and high safety to patients. In addition, our company is striving to become a company that can change the examination and treatment paradigm in the field of internal medicine by incorporating various convenience functions AI software. .

Currently, the surgical and interpretation skills of domestic medical staff are evaluated as very high globally. However, since most of the medical devices used by these highly skilled medical staff are foreign-made medical devices,, there are limits to supporting domestic medical staff. I found out that it exists. Medical staff want to use products that reflect better ideas, but since it is an overseas product, it was difficult to reflect the requirements of domestic medical staff . I started a business to solve this problem.

The company came up with electrification and artificial intelligence as key technologies for this., Patient, < span>We began our business in earnest by developing endoscope devices to develop medical devices that would be beneficial from the perspective of all doctors..

Please explain your main business

MediinTech provides three core technologies for medical flexible endoscopes: endoscopic scopes, and endoscopic imaging. We have secured original technology for processing devices and light source devices for endoscopes. In addition, , the endoscope motorization technology, which is different from existing endoscopes, will not only reduce medical staff fatigue and improve reading ability, but also provide procedure safety to patients. Can It also possesses AItechnology.

The characteristic of the existing endoscope is that the endoscope must change direction when entering the body., At this time, the medical staff directly controls the direction change by pulling it with the thumb of the left hand. It had to be controlled. Therefore, there was a chronic problem in the left hand of many medical staff that the weight of the handle was so heavy that musculoskeletal occupational diseases were common. In order to solve this problem, the company developed an electric scope, reducing the weight of the hand-held endoscope handle by half , Successful in implementing more accurate movements.

Also, The current misdiagnosis rate due to the medical staff's reading ability or endoscopic technique is 30% It is said that it reaches about. This can be attributed not only to fatigue of medical staff but also to deterioration of endoscope image quality. Accordingly, our product goes beyond the HD image quality of existing endoscopes and offers FHD image quality. It helps to make a clearer reading by providing .

In addition, in the case of artificial intelligence algorithms that are currently being used in many institutions, the ability to interpret lesions is not performed well due to lack of experience or clinical environmental factors. It plays a role in helping the parts that are not needed. Currently, our company is developing a software algorithm that automatically detects lesions such as polyps. 'Automatic lesion detection in the stomach and large intestine Developed an AI algorithm' and received medical device approval. This significantly reduces the misdiagnosis rate mentioned above based on the high accuracy value of over 90% , It is a key technology that will enable automation of endoscopic examination and treatment in the future.

In this way, our endoscope reduces the fatigue of medical staff and plays a role in assisting surgical procedures, thereby reducing the endoscopy time required for each patient, allowing more patients to be seen safely at the same time. . In addition, the unit price of the device is high because companies in certain countries are currently monopolizing the market., The company promotes reasonable prices, making it an economically viable option for hospitals. and reduced the burden on medical staff. We plan to introduce our products with various strengths in earnest as soon as possible.

If you have any future goals or directions

Endoscopes can be divided into flexible endoscopes and hard endoscopes, Flexible endoscopes are used in gastroenterology or urology, It is widely used in otolaryngology, and rigid endoscopes are used for surgeries such as laparoscopy. Medintech focused on the development of flexible endoscopes, and was the first to develop endoscopes for fire extinguishers, which have the largest and most widely used market but are technically difficult. .

Accordingly, the company first introduced this product to the medical device market and succeeded, and then developed various endoscopes using flexible endoscopes, such as additionally developing endoscopes for otolaryngology and urology. We want to expand the pipeline into the medical field. And because we believe that success in the domestic market means success in overseas markets, , We are building credibility through various clinical trials in Korea. We want to secure it.

And currently, medical device approval(FDA, CE , etc.) is required for overseas expansion. We are preparing, and based on this, North America, Europe, We plan to expand into Southeast Asia, etc. In the future, we plan to expand our scope to include natural orifice surgical robots that can encompass rigid and flexible endoscopes.

Finally, MediIntech uses the intelligence of Korea’s best medical staff to create various medical devices, The goal is to become a leading company that provides quality medical services to more people. To this end, we will drive technological growth centered on electric motorization technology and artificial intelligence technology. Just as existing laparoscopic surgery in the field of surgery is currently changing the surgical paradigm based on the electricization of surgical robots,, in the field of internal medicine, our company's flexible We aim to change the examination and treatment paradigm through endoscope motorization. In the future, our company will continue to strive to research and develop medical devices based on a sense of mission to domestically produce flexible endoscopes.