From the August 2012 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine
Today, there are few national producers of medical equipment in Mexico. The national industry is not developed, due in part to a lack of government incentives and solid competition from foreign producers. Indeed, if compared with the Brazilian medical devices national industry, able to produce sound quality products competing against imported devices, the Mexican industry appears to be barely more than a niche sector.

One of the differences that explain this mismatch is that, while Brazilian authorities have limited or taxed the import of foreign devices, Mexican authorities embarked on successive free trade agreements opening its market to foreign industrial production, including in the field of medical devices. This has had good results in increasing trade and attracting foreign capital but has also hindered the development of the national industry.

Diana Reyes, General Manager of Grupo SIM, a Mexican
local manufacturer and developer of high quality medical devices for life support, specialized in medical ventilators, brings her point of view to this issue. “I think that the Mexican medical devices industry has huge possibilities of future development: today it has not even attained 20% of its full potential. One of the problems is that in Mexico, usually, we do not in believe in ourselves nor in our products. Even national authorities mistrust Mexican articles. Paradoxically, they provide national companies with funds to support product development but once developed are reticent to acquire those products. This mistrust is the worst enemy for the national industry. For a Mexican company to be trusted nationally, it has first to succeed internationally, and that is exactly what Grupo SIM is going to do: we have ISO 9000 and FDA certificates and our objective is to distribute our equipment in the U.S.”
One of the clear problems accompanying lack of development of the national medical devices industry is the lack of innovation and product development. “I would personally like to see more innovation within the country, but sadly we are facing a scenario here in Mexico where young professionals prefer to work outside of Mexico and, if they do work in Mexico, they prefer to work for large multinational companies such as Siemens and Philips rather than working for Mexican companies. This supposes a clear obstacle for innovation,” says Arroba Ingeniera’s Dovarganes.

August 2012 Magazine

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