Erlangen (Germany) – Montréal (Canada), June 16, 2021  

The existing soft-landing activities of Medical Valley and MEDTEQ+ are further strengthened through a strategic partnership of these two healthcare innovation experts. This partnership will facilitate access for companies to the Canadian and vice versa German market and accompany them on their way to successfully establishing their business abroad.  

Through their similar mission to drive innovation and commercialization for economic development and quality of life improvement, Medical Valley and MEDTEQ+ both have a strong network focused on healthtech and digital health.  

As Canada is a world leader in AI, this is a great opportunity for German companies to collaborate with this ecosystem in co-developing and commercializing AI-based healthtech solutions. Since Medical Valley is part of the Digital Health Hub Nürnberg-Erlangen with a very strong focus on digitalization in medicine as well as various projects in the field of AI, the fact that an AI hub of excellence is located in Canada, and Montreal in particular, indicates very promising opportunities for this cooperation.  

In addition, Germany is the largest medtech European market and could be a new market for Canadian companies whereas Canada is a soft-landing for German companies willing to enter the North American market. Besides a comprehensive market access and business modelling support that covers the whole value chain, there is also the possibility to benefit from government funding if German companies partner with a company from Quebec. Based on value, a streamlined track to adoption can be initiated as well as buy-in from leadership. Moreover, they can gain access to the American market since Canada is an important gateway to the US.  

“I am delighted that Medical Valley and MEDTEQ+ are formalizing their cooperation. Since 2019 the Bavarian Minister of Science and the Minister for Digital Affairs, as well as Medical Valley, have visited Montréal with companies, universities, and Life Science experts to see first-hand how thriving the AI and Digital Health sector is in Montreal. Bavaria is the second largest state for MedTech companies in Germany and I believe the complementary expertise of both regions will contribute to new innovative projects and solutions in the field of health care. The sector is also a priority of the Cooperation between Bavaria and Québec with more good news on the subject to follow before the end of the year”, said Benjamin Emans, Director of the State of Bavaria office in Montréal.  

“This collaboration between Medical Valley and MEDTEQ+ stemming from growing dialogue over the past years, will offer great opportunities to Canadian and German companies in terms of new markets, funding and support. Medical Valley has strong expertise in digital health, which will lead to new exciting collaborative projects between our ecosystems, and will also benefit our Quebec AI companies”, stated Diane Côté, CEO of MEDTEQ+. 

“We are very happy about the official start of our already existing partnerships. We are constantly searching for trustful partners with the same mind-set to support rising medical technologies. With MEDTEQ+ we have found an ideal partner to strengthen our high-level capabilities in digital health and AI in Medtech. The Beachhead Program is the perfect gateway for German and Canadian companies to accelerate their time-to-market for innovations”, said Benjamin Stöcklein, Head of International Services of Medical Valley EMN e. V. 

 

About Medical Valley EMN 

The Medical Valley European Metropolitan Region Nuremberg (EMN) Association (www.medical-valley-emn.de) is a leading healthcare management cluster in Europe. Highly specialized research institutions, internationally leading companies as well as many growing companies are active here. They cooperate closely to jointly find solutions for the challenges of healthcare today and tomorrow. This extraordinary concentration of players, combined with the international market and competitive position of individual players, the unique infrastructure and services, all provide the conditions that allow ideas to be turned into products, processes and services more quickly. The nationally and internationally outstanding position of this leading economic region was additionally strengthened in January 2010 by the designation of “National Top Cluster” for medical technology by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). In April 2017, Medical Valley, in cooperation with the Zollhof Tech Incubator and the Health Hackers, was named one of twelve national “Digital Hubs” by the Federal Ministry of Economics – the only one that focuses exclusively on healthcare. Existing hubs of the urban-rural cluster Medical Valley EMN e. V. are the Medical Valley Center Erlangen, Forchheim, Amberg-Weiden and Bamberg.  

 

 

About MEDTEQ+ 

MEDTEQ+ (www.medteq.ca) is the pan-Canadian Consortium for Industrial Research and Innovation in Medical Technology. Its mission is to accelerate the development of innovative technological solutions to improve patients’ health and quality of life. MEDTEQ+ supports their validation and integration in the healthcare system and their impact, both locally and globally, by bringing together the complementary skills of industrial and academic partners, and with those of healthcare providers. MEDTEQ+ relies on the financial support of the Government of Quebec, the Government of Canada (delivered through the Centres of Excellence for Commercialization and Research (CECR)), the private sector and complementary partners to foster research-industry relations.