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The story of Elos Medtech in the polymer injection molding business (Part 1)

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Today, Elos Medtech in Skara is described as highly experienced in advanced precision molding tools and polymer injection molding. But as the saying goes, even an expert has to start at the bottom. And in this case – literally at the bottom – more specifically, in the basement of a house in the Swedish countryside. This is the story of a young entrepreneur who started his own business, soon to become Elos Medtech – a global CDMO to the medical device industry.

A small business for polymer processing

Helldin’s Mechanical was founded in 1971 by 22-year-old Göran Helldin. He started his business in the basement of his house in Skara, Sweden. The first customer was a manufacturer of household products, for which Helldin’s Mechanical carried out polymer processing. 

In 1975, the business moved into a small facility in the backyard, and machinery was bought. It wasn’t very spacious;  the staff had to share space with a lathe, a milling machine, a hacksaw, and a drill press. Welding and painting had to be done outdoors – if the weather allowed. But nevertheless, the business started to grow. 

Designing the first injection-molding tool

The company designed and manufactured its first own injection-molding tool during this period. For one of the customers, they made fixtures for cars and vacuum cleaners. When growing out of the facility, they moved into an old barn. There was no running water, and the barn needed some renovation, including a new floor, a new door, and new windows. At this time, Helldin’s Mechanical manufactured several injection-molding tools and injection molded plastic parts such as threaded plugs for industrial tools and equipment.

Injection molding for the medical device industry

In the late seventies, Helldin’s Mechanical changed the company name to Microplast, and the business moved into newly built premises. The workforce had increased to twelve people, and Microplast now had a complete workshop of injection-molding tools and capacity to produce injection-molded plastic parts on a larger scale.

In the early eighties, Microplast closed a deal with their first medical device company. This was a significant milestone. The deal included the injection molding of plastic parts for a chromatography system. At this time, Microplast had already designed nearly 100 different injection-molding tools.

In 1984, the same company placed an order of injection-molding tools and prototypes for a socket of an allergy blood test. At that moment, nobody could imagine the future scope. Today, this product is distributed worldwide – and Elos Medtech is still their trusted partner.

Want to know what happened next? Read The story of Elos Medtech (Part 2)

vitrolife-700x350

“Elos Medtech is a supplier that lives up to our demands and makes suggestions for improvements”

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How does one meet the medtech market’s growing need for high-quality products and solutions? At Elos Medtech, we see that having a close dialogue with customers and taking full responsibility for the production process is a good way to go. The work that we do together with our customer Vitrolife is an example of that.  

Working closely with customers to create customized medical device solutions

As a development and production partner in the medtech industry, the main priority is to provide high-quality medical device products to customers. This requires a deep understanding of regulatory requirements, customers’ challenges and the product’s applications. Therefore, it is important to not only have expertise in the field but also have a close cooperation with customers throughout the entire production process. That way, we can create customized solutions that match their specific needs. In addition, it is important for us to take full responsibility for the different phases of the production process. We call this way of working Complete Performance and it includes all the stages from development and design to production and delivery of the finished product.

Connected to this, and equally important, is to continuously optimize our own organization’s internal processes. Identifying opportunities for continuous improvements enable us to maintain high levels of accuracy, capacity and innovation in everything we do.

Vitrolife – contributing products within the IVF field

Vitrolife is one of Elos Medtech’s customers and provides solutions and services for assisted reproduction. The dishes that are used when culturing embryos have been developed by Vitrolife and are produced by Elos Medtech at Elos Medtech Microplast. The culture dishes are made of the material Polystyrene and are injection moulded in an entirely hands-off production process. The risks of unwanted particles entering the containers and potentially disturb the cell cultivation are therefore minimized.

“Our vision is to fulfill the dream of having a child. This inspires us to develop medical device solutions for IVF treatment that increase the quality of life for couples worldwide. We want a long-term and close cooperation with our suppliers to make sure that our products always meet our requirements as well as those of the clinics and authorities. Elos Medtech is a supplier that lives up to our demands and that also makes suggestions for improvements on the product and the production process. Because we can trust that the products from Elos Medtech always meet the customers’ expectations, we can also be sure to help people across the world that are longing for a child“, says Göran Mellbin, responsible for production and quality of plastic parts for IVF at Vitrolife.

Elos Medtech’s commitment to the diagnostic market

The work that Elos Medtech does together with Vitrolife is a part of our commitment to the diagnostic segment. For more than 40 years, we have gained experience in this area and developed our expertise within injection moulding as well as design and manufacture of moulding tools of plastic products. Our vision of “Transforming Medical Technology and Advancing Quality of Life Worldwide” goes hand in hand with Vitrolife’s aim to make meaningful changes in people’s lives. We believe that Complete Performance, continuous improvements and having a close dialogue with customers are important parts of our operations to reach that vision.

I hope you enjoyed reading this blog article about Elos Medtech’s way of working and our cooperation with Vitrolife. Feel free to contact us with any questions, visit our website for more information and our Knowledge blog to read more of our blog articles.

5 Injection Moulding Trends in the Medtech Industry

5 Injection-Moulding Trends in the Medtech Industry

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The art of injection-moulding has been around for decades. But over the years, the technique has become more refined and the materials more sophisticated. Today, it is possible to produce plastic details with maximum precision and accuracy in dimension and surface. However, new market demands are constantly challenging the production process. In this blog post, I will share 5 injection-moulding trends in the medtech industry and what we do at Microplast to keep up with the new demands.

1. Injection-moulded products produced in Europe are becoming more attractive

The last fifteen to twenty years, China has had a dominant position in mass production of injection-moulded plastic products, and many companies have outsourced their production to the country due to its low labour cost. But we are now starting to see companies returning their production to Europe because of quality reasons. Chinese medtech companies purchase moulding tools as well as injection-moulded plastic products from Europe because of the poor quality in their domestic market. At Microplast, process control and quality follow-up have always been an extremely important part of our production process to meet the most stringent requirements on quality. We follow appropriate ISO standards and ensure a high level of process management and control. Quality awareness permeates our entire operation.

2. Automation is leading the way for injection-moulding in the medtech industry

In recent years, a wave of automation has swept over the medtech industry worldwide. There is an ongoing trend to increase production efficiency with the benefits of reduced human labor costs, saved energy and materials – but more importantly – improved quality, accuracy, and precision. To meet the demands of tomorrow’s market, Microplast recently extended our production site in Sweden and made ambitious investments in the latest high-tech robots, injection-moulding machines and equipment for clean room manufacturing. This allows us to further increase and streamline our production of injection-moulded products.

3. More partners along the supply chain are realising the advantages of traceability

Traceability is an important factor in the production of medtech products, especially the small plastic details used inside the body, as non-compliant materials can be a matter of life or death for the patient. Today, more partners along the supply chain are realising the advantages of traceability. It is in multiple partners’ interests to comply with local and international policies and regulations, and reduce the risk of non-compliant materials entering the supply chain. Traceability also provides coordination between authorities and relevant bodies, and can be used as a method of stock control and monitoring. At Microplast, the injection moulding process is fully traceable, from the point at which the thermoplastics material is delivered to us, until the products are delivered to the end user. Every batch has its own unique identification, allowing it to be traced at any time through our database.

4. Higher demands on delivery precision and packaging of medtech products

We can see a clear trend where more customers place higher demands on delivery precision and packaging. Many companies want to maximise the efficiency of their logistics and have their products delivered to the door – sterilised, packaged and ready to use in a clinical situation. At Microplast, we now have the possibility to carry out the actual injection-moulding of the plastic products in clean rooms, where we also perform testing, product assembly, packaging and labelling. Thanks to our VMI system, we can also guarantee that our customers always have the right number of products at the right time.

5. Customers request a single source from design to manufacturing and distribution

Another strong trend in the medtech industry is that companies want to outsource not only the manufacturing, but the entire production process – to one single contract manufacturer. The reason is higher demands on work processes, documentation, quality, accuracy and precision. To meet this challenge, Microplast is offering a complete performance, meaning that we take care of everything from design and manufacturing to packaging, distribution and logistics. To us, an important part of this is working closely with our customers, especially in the design and development phase, bringing knowledge to the table and helping our customers make the right choices of materials and injection-moulding processes right from the start of their product’s life cycle.

We produce more than just a piece of plastic – we produce life-changing medical devices

At Microplast, we have been producing injection-moulded plastic products since 1971. A lot has changed over the years, but one thing has remained the same – our products still make a difference. Our products are used in medical areas such as diagnostics, cardiac rhythm management and in vitro fertilisation, meaning, we actually help save people’s lives.

It is with great pleasure I can say that we look forward to new market demands in the medtech industry, so that we can continue to improve life saving products! Does that make sense to you? Please let me know by sharing your thoughts it in social media.

Also, read:

The Microplast Story – from a basement operation to over 900 injection-moulded parts

We now double our capacity thanks to our new factory at Microplast

The expert of thermoplastic components with fine tolerances

4 techniques for measuring injection-moulded plastic parts

Mathias Andersson Managing Director at Microplast

“We now double our capacity thanks to our new factory at Microplast”

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Because of a growing medtech industry and high customer demands, Elos Medtech decided to expand their factory in Skara, Sweden. I interviewed Mathias Andersson, Managing Director at Microplast, about his role at the company, the reasons for the expansion and in what way the expansion will benefit Elos Medtech’s customers.


Mathias, tell me about your career at Microplast. What does your role as Managing Director involve?  
Well, I started working as Managing Director at Microplast in March 2012, a little over four years ago now. When recruiting for my position, they were looking for a market-oriented Managing Director who would be assigned the mission to increase turnover while maintaining profitability. The mission was also to, within five years time, expand the factory. But thanks to all of the competent employees and their hard work, the expansion of the factory didn’t need to wait that long, but saw the light of day already after four years.

In my job, I mostly work with strategic matters to continue to enable future growth. I often discuss with our customers about their future needs, and together we create what we call a road map, which enables us to plan ahead to make sure that our customers’ needs are in line with our capacity. In this way, we make sure to always stay at the forefront of our industry. Another part of my job is to make sure that we have the right organization and competence, and that we invest in the latest equipment, to maintain a high degree of automation. Beyond that, I have traditional Managing Director tasks, for example responsibility for the operations and budget.   

Prior to Microplast – what was your occupation?
The last ten to fifteen years I have worked with Marketing and Sales in leading positions. During that time, I operated within business-to-business and worked mainly in the plastics industry. Just before I started working at Microplast, I worked as Marketing and Sales Manager at a company manufacturing plastic packaging for the food industry. My responsibility was dairies in the Nordics and food-service products in Europe. There are tremendous demands in the food-industry when it comes to for example clean environments, therefore it has a lot of similarities with the medtech industry. In addition, I have also worked with technical support with a focus on quality, product training and sales support, among other things. One could say that I have a solid background and experience in different businesses, mainly within the industrial segment.

So, tell me a little bit about Microplast. What kind of business do you have there?
Microplast was founded in 1971, so we turn 45 years this year! Elos Medtech acquired Microplast in 2011, at that time we were 13 people working here. Today, we are 24 people working in the facilities, which consist of both office space and a factory. At Microplast, we manufacture technically advanced plastic parts for the medtech industry. We manufacture plastic parts for products such as hearing aids, pacemakers, diagnostics, analysis instruments, disposable articles for blood analyses, dental products and surgical instruments suitable for orthopedics. Above that, we  provide production in clean rooms, as well as produce and assemble products, which we deliver to our customers after sterilization.

We also offer a number of different refining steps where we use ultrasonic welding, machining, printing, assembling and packing. We do everything we can to give our customers as much value as possible. We work with all kinds of plastics but mainly high performance plastics like for example PEEK, POM and PVDF. These plastics replace metal and are meant to cope with specific demands such as chemical resistance or heat resistance, or be exposed to pressure or heat. We also work with polyolefins like for example PS, PE, PP in medical grades to use in disposable labware products.         

Soon, you will inaugurate your new factory expansion at Microplast. What are the main causes for the expansion?
One of the objectives when I started as Managing Director was to increase sales and consequently expand our factory. Our current factory has become too small, with no room for the production lines that we need. Due to the increased demands from both current and new customers, we needed to expand, which we of course are glad to do! Our new factory will handle projects from both new and present customers, and the purpose of the expansion is to be able to grow long-term with our customers. Our workshop is now attached to the new factory as well, so we have the possibility to broaden our post processing in form of assembling, completion of products and much more. To deliver finished details is an increasing demand from our customers, one that we will be able to undertake more of with the new expansion.         

What was your role in the project, and how has the process proceeded?
In autumn 2014, we started with the planning of building the new factory, and the board gave clearance for construction start in spring 2015. My role in the expansion process was to be a part of a steering group consisting of a couple of key persons. Together with an internal construction coordinator and an external project leader, the steering group has made sure that the functions and spaces which we have ordered are at the right place at the right time, and in line with our budget and strategy plan. Subcontractors and an architecture firm have been responsible for construction, architecture, and project management. From the moment we put the shovel in the ground, the project has taken us little less than a year. For such a major project, the process has been really efficient. The new equipment consists of several new machine lines. However, we will not fill the whole factory from start, but we will successively invest in new equipment to be able to adjust our equipment to the future needs of our customers. We now have the possibility to double our capacity compared to before, which is great!

What have you got planned for the inauguration day?
The inauguration will take place the 26th of April, which is the same day as the Annual General Meeting, which will be held later that afternoon. There will be a guided tour of our facilities, both the present and the new one. Inauguration speeches will be held and we will have specially invited guests such as shareholders, stakeholders from Elos Medtech, the municipality, press, vendors and customers.

What will the expansion of the factory mean for the customers?
Our customers will be able to assign more production to us and we will be able to offer a commitment that means more processing and more delivery of finished products. We will have a high degree of automation, with focus on quality as usual, which means that we will be strong compared to our competitors. Our expansion enables us to grow with our customers. Our goal is to grow and expand our business to meet the increased requirements in the medtech industry. We also create a platform to increase and supply the right competence internally.

What kind of challenges and trends do you see ahead, within the medtech industry?
The product development is much faster today than it was before. Today there is a larger focus on both patient safety and patient benefits. This will lead to higher demands, both on the manufacturers and the product owners, which are our customers. A challenge is to cope with these demands and make sure that we always are best when it comes to quality, delivery and production. With our new factory, we believe we are a force to be reckoned with in the future, within the medtech industry.  

Thank you for a nice chat, Mathias. Your expansion of the factory at Microplast sure sounds exciting, as well as promising for the future of the medtech industry. If you have any questions, please contact us or visit our website to read more about Elos Medtech and Microplast.    

From small operation to over 900 injection-moulded plastic parts for the medtech industry

The Microplast Story – from a small basement operation to over 900 injection-moulded plastic parts for the medtech industry

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Today, Microplast can be described as the expert of advanced precision moulding tools and injection-moulded plastic parts. But as the saying goes, even an expert has to start at the bottom. And in this case – literally at the bottom – more specifically, in the basement of a house in the Swedish countryside! This is the story of a young entrepreneur who started up his own business, soon to become Microplast.

Let us begin with the beginning – a small basement operation for series processing

Microplast, at the time called Helldin’s Mechanical, was founded in 1971 by 22-year-old Göran Helldin. He started out his business in the basement of his own dwelling house, located in Hangelösa, a small village north of Skara in Sweden. The first customer was a manufacturer of household products, for which the business carried out series processing of small plastic details.

Moving from the basement to a shed – designing the very first injection-moulding tool

In 1975, the business moved into a small shed in the backyard. Aged machinery was bought, but it wasn’t very spacious; the staff had to share the small space in the shed together with a lath, a milling machine, a hacksaw and a drill press. Welding and painting had to be done outdoors – if the weather allowed! The company also manufactured their first own injection-moulding machine during this period.

Despite the small space, the business started to grow and soon they got new customers. The first injection-moulding tool was designed and also a milling machine for processing plastic parts. For one of the new customers, fixtures for joining interior components for cars were designed and manufactured. Also, glue fixtures for joining the walls inside of vacuum cleaners were made for another customer. In addition, new automated solutions were ordered.

When growing out of the shed, the business moved into an old barn in Dalvik, at the outskirts of Lundsbrunn. There was no running water and the barn needed some restoration, including a new floor, a new door, and windows. At this time, the company had produced several injection-moulding tools, and was producing plastic parts in the self-made moulding machine. For example a threaded plastic plug to a manufacturer of industrial tools and equipment.

Microplast was put on the map – nobody could imagine the future scope

In the late seventies, the name was changed to Microplast. It was now time to move the business into the newly built premises Bagarebo in Hangelösa, outside of Skara. The workforce had now increased to twelve people. Microplast had a complete workshop of injection-moulding tools and also the possibility to provide injection-moulding of plastic parts.

In the beginning of the eighties, Microplast closed its first deal with a medtech company. It included the manufacturing of plastic parts for a system used for separating molecules by gel filtration, also called chromatography. At this time, Microplast had already designed and manufactured nearly 100 different injection-moulding tools when another 16 were ordered. Getting the opportunity to produce plastic parts for biotechnology was a significant milestone for the company. Today, Microplast still has an extensive cooperation with that company´s new owner.

In 1984, the same medtech company placed a new order of injection-moulding tools and prototypes for the socket of an allergy blood test. At that moment, nobody could imagine the future scope! Today, the product is distributed by worldwide. It is part of an allergy portfolio detecting sensitizations to more than 600 allergens.

Moving to Skara – development continues

In 1993, Microplast made its last stop when moving to the existing premises in Skara. Since then, the number of medtech parts has increased along with a large number of automated solutions. Since 1997, everything is designed in 3D CAD. The production plant in Skara does everything from total technical solutions including the design of moulding tools, choice of material, design of components and production equipment, to the adaptation of a product to a customer’s production and equipment.

In 2011, Microplast was acquired by Elos Medtech Group. The year after, a new warehouse was built and some year later investments were made in injection-moulding technique in clean room cells, and injection-moulding tools employed by industrial robots. Today, there are twenty injection-moulding machines in operation in total. In the beginning of 2015, Microplast started the expansion of the production plant in Skara, which was completed in 2016. With an additional 1,500 square meters, Microplast managed to double its capacity. The extended production plant has clean rooms for assembly, packaging and production in a clean room environment. The production is largely automated and the operation is certified according to ISO 13485.

Still going strong after decades in the injection-moulding business

It is very rewarding to announce that 30 years after designing and developing the prototypes for the first plastic socket for the blood test, Microplast is now developing a joint plan together with customers to increase cooperation in the years ahead. This has resulted in several major projects, including more production lines and automated solutions, which will constitute a key aspect of the company’s growth in the next coming years.

In spring 2016, the company projects a large purchase including injection-moulding machines, high-tech robots, and equipment for clean room manufacturing to increase the production even more, with focus on standards, quality and traceability for medtech components.

The future of Microplast looks nothing else but promising. Today, Microplast has 900 registered injection-moulded plastic parts, and the guess is that the number will only increase as time goes by!

We hope you enjoyed reading about the Microplast story. Would you like to know more about our extended production plant? Keep an eye out for upcoming articles! Until next time, see you in the social networks!