MedTech Atelier: the new prototyping lab for medical devices

Got a MedTech project you want to test in 3D? As part of its lifetech.brussels cluster, hub.brussels has established a new facility to support businesses in the life sciences sector!

A key public stakeholder in the MedTech industry in the Brussels-Capital Region, hub.brussels has developed several services and programmes to support businesses, via its lifetech.brussels cluster, including the MedTech Accelerator®.

Thanks to these wide-ranging services and programmes, which support innovative spin-offs and start-ups at every stage of their journey, the lifetech sector has undergone positive development in Brussels, expanding from 96 medtech/ehealth businesses in 2004 to 134 in 2016, a 40% increase.

An “All inclusive” facility for MedTech devices

However, there was one missing link in this chain of services: a facility dedicated to the early stage prototyping of medical devices.

It is essential for businesses to be able to develop, validate and improve their prototypes, in a location close to hospitals, which tend to be the leading adopters and users of their solutions.

This is why MedTech Atelier was born. Located within BLSI, the Brussels-based life science incubator, this new facility will, from 19 December 2019, offer a wide selection of tools required to prototype medical devices, under the supervision of the company Covartim, experts in the field.

Via our lifetech.brussels cluster, users will also benefit from the free guidance and expertise of our advisors.

A first in Belgium

MedTech Atelier is a totally unique service in Belgium, both in terms of the diversity and quality of the equipment made available to entrepreneurs and the support they will receive. But what makes it quite exceptional is the pooling of resources.

 Azèle Mathieu, head of lifetech.brussels, explains:

Our objective is to complete the ecosystem of resources available in Brussels to make it a favourable environment for the emergence and development of projects in the medical device. Because of our role as a cluster and therefore as an assembly, it seemed critical to us to start from a repertoire of existing skills, private and public, to complete them and to put them forward with a clear entry door and a clear brand: the MedTech Atelier®

hub.brussels worked with technical partners and contractors to identify existing equipment in the region and identify gaps.