Monday, October 6, 2008

Local medical equipment firm takes aim at imports

YUTHANA PRAIWAN

A Thai medical research house, Chiang Mai Med Tech Co, is developing cheaper hospital equipment to substitute for imported machinery.

In collaboration with the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA), the company has successfully developed low-temperature steam formaldehyde equipment (known as LTSF). It sterilises at low temperatures heat-sensitive medical equipment such as rubber tubes and plastic pipes.

Financial and technical support for the project was provided by the Industrial Technology Assistant Programme (ITAP), which is intended to bring new technology developed by private and state agencies into the market.

Suchat Satrvech, managing director of Systems Partnership, a subsidiary of Chiang Mai Med Tech, said the company was now ready to introduce the product on the market at a third of the price of imported equipment.

Mr Suchat said the company had struggled after investing heavily to develop its LTSF model. Until the company completed a prototype in 1991, he said its product was hardly accepted by hospitals.

"You will never know how hard we worked to overcome buyers' bias against Thai products," he said. "Even though our equipment was proven by the Royal Thai Army laboratory, which even helped guarantee its reliability, buyers remained uninterested."

Mr Suchat said the company's fortunes revived after a lecturer at Chiang Mai University told him that the NSTDA had opened a branch in the northern city. Early last year he applied to join the ITAP programme to develop a marketing plan to launch the product commercially.

ITAP provided 30% of the total expenditure for technical tests along with full support from its technical researchers.

The former Surayud Chulanont government's policy, focused on upgrading equipment in hospitals and clinics in remote areas, also helped bring a warmer welcome for the LTSF product - which, at three million baht a unit, costs a third of the price of the Swedish-made market leader that has long dominated the Thai market.

Currently, the company sells five units a month and has production costs of around 600,000 baht per unit.

"Our first client was Chiang Rai Prachanukroh Hospital and our latest order is from Khon Kaen University Hospital," said Mr Suchat.

He added that the government's mission to improve public health services to meet the standards of the private sector could be accomplished by developing cheaper Thai-made technologies instead of depending on Western products.