With the rapid development of the field of medical testing in my country, clinical testing instruments have developed from semi-automatic analysis to fully automatic analysis, and the laboratory work mode has also developed from a single device automatic work to a full laboratory automation work. The laboratory automation assembly line can reduce labor costs, reduce the risk of biological infection, improve work efficiency and management level, and upgrade from a stand-alone mode to a full laboratory automation solution mode, which has become a popular track in the field of medical testing.
According to statistics, my country's laboratory assembly lines have grown rapidly after 2012, with a compound annual growth rate of more than 100%. As of the end of 2016, the number of assembly lines in the market has reached 1,500. However, the laboratory automation assembly line market in my country has long been occupied by foreign companies such as Roche, Siemens, Beckman, Abbott, and Orcendor. For the purpose of "brand protection" by foreign manufacturers, automation solutions of different brands have been formed instead of hospitals. Automation solutions for needs and pain points. The open assembly line is an automation solution centered on customer needs. The closed assembly line is an automation solution with the brand as the core of the product. The assembly lines installed in major hospitals are all closed-end designs and cannot be compatible with instruments of different brands, which greatly restricts the hospital's ability to expand testing items and cost control capabilities.
Since one manufacturer cannot solve all inspection needs, domestic hospitals often purchase multiple brand instruments. Take chemiluminescence analyzers as an example. Basically every hospital above Class 2 will use 3 or more brands of instruments to ensure testing. Precision and cost control. Therefore, hospitals urgently need an open laboratory automation assembly line that can be compatible with instruments of different brands. In foreign countries, Japan and the United States have fully used open assembly lines, and open assembly lines will also be the trend of medical testing in China.
SinoMed is one of the few domestic companies that focus on the research and development of open laboratory automation solutions. The company’s technical team has many years of experience in the field of industrial automation. At the same time, it has great expertise in the processing of small parts, pneumatic, electric, fusion robots, and control. Strong engineering capabilities, with nearly 20 years of practical experience in visible light analysis instruments and indoor automation solutions, as well as the ability to design various automation instruments, algorithms, controls, optical measurement, mechanical and hydraulic and error systems.
Relying on the company’s team’s professional background and advantages in laboratory automation assembly lines, SinoMed has launched an open laboratory automation assembly line solution that is compatible with different brands and different inspection instruments, which effectively improves inspection efficiency and reduces biosafety Risks have improved cost control capabilities.
At present, the company's laboratory automation pipeline has been installed in Shandong Provincial Hospital, the Second Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University, Jinyu Medical and other hospitals and third-party medical laboratories. At the same time, the company has reached cooperation with many well-known inspection instrument manufacturers at home and abroad.
Self-developed assembly line reduces labor costs by 30%-75% and reagent costs by 30%-45%
SinoMed was established in 1992. In the course of nearly 30 years of development, the company has always been market-oriented and has continued to develop a variety of medical devices. In 1994, the company developed a variety of rehabilitation equipment such as blood oximeters and microwave multifunctional therapeutic equipment. In 1997, the company entered the biochemical analysis market and successively developed a number of fully automatic biochemical analyzers and reagent products. The products were successfully sold throughout the country and More than 60 countries overseas.
Sun Chengxin said: “Starting a business in the IVD industry requires finding new growth points every 5-10 years.” In 2010, after the company's biochemical analyzer products gained a foothold in the market, they began to think about the company's next development direction.
After investigation, I set my sights on the laboratory automation assembly line track. He said: "Laboratory automation assembly line technology has a high threshold and requires the team to have a deep understanding of automation. At the same time, with the rapid growth of the IVD market, the continuous increase of inspection items and the increase in sample size, customers will gradually increase their dependence on automation. And, pay attention Everyone in health economics knows that a per capita income of US$2,000 is the node of human-machine interchange." Sun Chengxin believes that China will reach the node of human-machine interchange around 2025, and automation solutions will have a spurt of development. Therefore, in 2010, SinoMed began to develop laboratory automation assembly line technology and modules.
The laboratory automation assembly line solution developed by Sinomed includes biochemistry, immunity, blood coagulation, urine, etc., which realizes the automation of the whole process of sample loading, separation, classification, capping, detection, and review, which can reduce sample turnover time and reduce Biohazard risks in small laboratories, improve personnel utilization and operational efficiency, and reduce error rates. Data shows that this solution can reduce labor costs by 30%-75% and reagent costs by 30%-45%.
It is worth noting that the assembly line developed by SinoMed is fully open, with rich interfaces, and can be connected to the instruments of mainstream manufacturers at home and abroad. Under the normal use of the customer’s existing equipment, reagents, and sites, the testing equipment can be combined according to customer needs , Flexible collocation of various functional modules, rapid realization of automation solutions.
SinoMed's laboratory automation assembly line has obtained a number of patents. In 2018, the company's assembly line was approved for sale. At present, it has installed more than 50 machines in many tertiary hospitals and third-party medical laboratories at home and abroad. Next, as the company has successively reached cooperation with a number of internationally renowned brands, the installed capacity will increase rapidly. At the same time, it is developing the automation of molecular biology detection and liquid phase mass spectrometry detection.
Within 5-10 years, my country is expected to completely break the import monopoly of laboratory automation assembly lines
With favorable policies, my country's IVD market will continue to maintain rapid growth, and the testing items and sample size will increase significantly. It is difficult for single-machine testing to meet the testing needs of a large number of samples. And with the advancement of hierarchical diagnosis and treatment, laboratory automation assembly lines will no longer be exclusive to large tertiary hospitals. In the future, my country's demand for laboratory automation assembly lines will increase. It is expected that the total number of assembly lines in the future may exceed 3,000. At the same time, under the impact of the centralized procurement policy, reagent prices are getting lower and lower, and open assembly lines with higher efficiency and better cost performance must be the mainstream.
At present, there are about 1,200 modular pipelines in the country, and the penetration rate needs to be improved, which provides opportunities for domestic enterprises. Sun Chengxin said: "With the continuous improvement of the technical level of domestic laboratory automation assembly line products and the introduction of a number of policies that favor domestic equipment, I believe that in the next 5-10 years, my country will be able to completely break the import monopoly of IVD laboratory automation assembly lines and realize exports. ."
Sun Chengxin believes that next, my country's laboratory automation pipeline will quickly enter the post-automation era, and robotics will be more integrated into laboratory automation solutions. At the same time, the laboratory automation solution will have more complete information system functions, with intelligent functions such as emergency, calibration, quality control, and automatic report review. As the first domestic enterprise to deploy open laboratory assembly lines, SinoMed has already occupied the first-mover advantage. The company is integrating intelligent robot technology to develop a new generation of assembly lines to further break through the laboratory space and space constraints, improve flexibility and reduce costs. "It is estimated that in 2-3 years, the company's new generation of assembly lines will be implemented in hospitals." At the same time, micro and small automation solutions are being developed for use in central laboratories and specialized hospitals.
