MedTech Opinion Leader: Jacob Ahrnstein about being MedTech CEO in Europe, Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Njord MedTech.

Stan: What is it like to be a CEO of a European MedTech Start Up?

Jacob: It’s great fun. Being a CEO at a start-up you have a wide range of responsibilities and also have to be in-depth operational. All from visiting new hospitals, entering new markets to prototyping next generation solutions and interviewing potential team members.?

Europe and medtech specifically - you’re operating in a rather diverse set of markets with local language and culture barriers which you will have to adapt to when building your organisation. In addition, the industry is one of the most regulated and Europe with the MDR requirements has set the highest of standards. This adds another layer of complexity to the business limiting your agility and speed of development, normally being one of the great advantages of operating a start-up.???

Stan: Why Did you choose MedTech as your Entrepreneurship path?

Jacob: During my career I’ve had the privilege of working with early research yet decided if commercially viable, supporting executive management at multinationals on their next investment decision, and building digital & IoT solutions on existing open source frameworks. Within this context, one of my early tenures was with a university spin-out applying material science to develop a new type of x-ray tube with decreased emission. A couple of years later, my former professor at the university introduced me to a project with radiology focus which today is Njord Medtech.?

Stan: What is unique about Njord MedTech?

Jacob: Looking outside-in I’d say that Njord Medtech is unique in the sense that >99% of all ideas from inside a university hospital never become a viable commercial product implemented at +30 hospitals. So that is quite unique in itself.?

In addition, Njord Medtech is rather unique having managed - after only a couple of years - to build up European operations and footprint with limited resources and individuals. This is due to the fact that we have strong multidisciplinary and multilingual individuals in our team with extensive medtech industry- and clinical experience.?

Stan: Who is the team behind the innovation??

Jacob: I met with Barbro Cagner, the idea provider, a couple of years ago. During this time it was an incubated project at the Sahlgrenska University Hospital in Gothenburg. We received funding for building the first prototypes, thereafter validating the solution at ten Swedish hospitals and had them bring about additional requirements for an industrialised version. Once the customers had validated our solution we decided to found the company - Njord Medtech.??

Throughout the company journey we have been fortunate to come across great individuals that have supported our journey of which some have decided to join our band. Today we're a solid team of around twelve people operating from Nordics, Switzerland, Germany, Netherlands and UK. Several of the team members have worked for both scale-ups and prominent medtech companies such as St Jude Medical, Medtronic, and Cochlear. ?

Stan: How did you come up with a solution?

Jacob: My co-founder, Barbro, had a good understanding of the problem space having worked at the radiology department for +30 years in different roles - both as radiographer and part of the management team at the department. During her role as union representative she had several of the team members suffering from physical pain in back, shoulders and wrist from the patient transfers. She later also noted that the extra team members called in for lift support every now and then had a negative impact on the workflow resulting in clinical inefficiencies.?

Since the problem space was clear and mutlifold, the question was rather how to build a nimble solution that fits well into the workflow.?

We started out with prototyping three different solutions and after initial validation we decided to go for one which we then secured further customer validation on. This version was the embryo that has been iterated and developed further into what is today the product Atle? 180.??

Stan: Could you tell us more about the device itself?

Jacob: It’s a motorised patient transfer solution enabling smooth one person transfer of patients from a bed to examination table.?

What is unique with the Atle? 180 is that the acute care departments don't have to apply up to six team members lifting or rolling over the patient from one side to the other. Since the radiology department typically staff with two caregivers they will have to call in and wait for lift support resulting in an inefficient workflow. In addition there is patient risk since the transfer can be quite jerky and unstable. The conventional method is especially cumbersome for patients with hip fractures.?

With our collaborative robotic solution we enable one radiographer to conduct the transfer in a patient friendly manner via just pressing a button on a hand control. The Atle? 180 is today used at CT, MRI, X-ray, Interventional Radiology and Radiotherapy departments in Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Germany, Netherlands and UK.?

Stan: What impact are you trying to make in the Hospitals?

Jacob: Overall we want to make a sizable contribution creating a sustainable healthcare system. With the Atle? 180 we see we can solve for the two problematic emerging trends; healthcare staff shortage and unproportionally increased number of radiology examinations.??

Our first case study at a Swedish acute radiology department indicates that we could apply freed up clinical time to increase radiology throughput by more than 20%. This would imply up to 10 million more CT scans in Europe per year with a maintained number of healthcare staff. If we could enable this while securing increased patient satisfaction during lateral transfers, we’d be both happy and proud.

Stan: How do you envision the future of your company?

Jacob: The strategy of becoming a category leader in Northern Europe with a wide positive impact on the healthcare sector is starting to take form. During the last six months we have successfully recruited a new sales manager in the Nordics and two product specialists in the UK, resulting in connection to newly established NHS Imaging Network Directors.?

We’re also in the midst of establishing strategic partnership with larger radiology equipment providers with two cases already ongoing in Sweden.

Stan Kalinin draws on an extensive track record of more than 14 years of search and executive team-building expertise. He is the host of MedTech Opinion Leader supporting growth of MedTech industry and creating insightful stories with key market executives forging alternative narrative about the sector current and future trends.