Meiban’s Designershive provides a fun and creative area for company designers to work and collaborate.

For a peek into how an Asian medical-device firm might innovate, consider the example of Meiban in Singapore. It started out as a plastics injection molder in a small shop in Singapore and now has contract manufacturing facilities in China and Malaysia as well as Singapore. Helen Ho, an industrial designer at Meiban, says the company wanted to do something different in adding industrial design to the existing engineering and manufacturing capabilities. So she developed the idea of the “Designershive,” group for designers.

“We looked to nature for inspiration,” she says. “It gave us the idea of bees and honey as a metaphor for industrial design. The philosophy works well for us in many ways. For example, designs should be soothing like honey. Everyday life is frustrating enough, so there is no need to produce products that are hard to use. For instance, packaging is often difficult to open. And devices with too many buttons make it hard for patients or doctors to keep track of which button does what. We think that good design is like creating honey, which is renowned for its soothing and medicinal effects.”

When customers need help on an existing design, the Designershive designers first determine the technical specifications, how the device is being used, and what is wrong with the current design. For a whole new product, though, they start with market research. “We then establish the form factor and how to incorporate the needed technology,” says Ho. “We also advise the customer on texture, color, and other factors that will affect the whole design and user interface.”

Form language studies

The Designershive designers also perform a form language study. “For example, say we are helping to develop a hand-held medical device,” says Ho. “It can come in many forms, but as a hand-held device the form is restricted in size. So we will create about 10 possible forms for each device out of any moldable material, such as clay. A focus group is organized with everyday profile users who then hold each form and grade it from 1 to 5. This method gives us the form that seems to resonate with most people, and as a result, it will be the form we use. Tests can also get more complex. These may involve studying color and texture. We use the phrase ‘form language studies’ because the product is ‘speaking’ to the user.”

The respirator is an example of a Meiban medical device made using injection molded components.

Today’s consumers — both patients and doctors — are very discerning, says Ho. “If it were just engineers creating parts, the components would come out looking purely functional,” she says. “In the past, this would have been fine because people bought just for function. However, now people buy because devices look good. Companies looking to create successful products thus require industrial design.”

Consider a typical businessman as an example of today’s consumer, says Ho. He has had a heart attack, goes to the hospital, and gets an operation. After a while, he is sent home, well enough to go back to work. “The individual needs a machine or device, a highly engineered product, to monitor his heart to ensure he does not have another heart attack or even a stroke,” she says. “The device signals him to pop a pill should his heart start pumping irregularly. When he attends meetings in front of his CEO, he doesn’t want to pick up a device that looks like a medical product. Otherwise, his colleagues would always be asking what’s wrong; what’s going on? So he wants a small device that looks like a cell phone or a pager.”

For this particular product, the Designershive’s designers would not suggest white (like many medical devices). “Instead, we would probably make it a metallic grey with a nice texture that adds to the product’s status,” says Ho. “Or, depending on the form factor, adding some professional black might be interesting.”

Let’s wow consumers

The Designershive designers must ensure the ideas they draw on paper or in the computer can actually be injection molded,” says Ho. “Think back to the ancient past when man wanted to fly. He imagined building a huge set of wings that would let him soar. But the technology obviously did not work. Fast-forward to today, when jets take people almost everywhere. Technology has supported this advancement. “Likewise, the link between man’s imagination and the timing of technology is critical in our manufacturing processes,” she says.

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