Medical device manufacturers and their mobile health apps: Big, American, expensive and lucrative – Participate in new survey on “Medtech’s role in the Internet of Medical Things” in cooperation with Deloitte

Medical device manufacturers stand out in the digital health eco-system. Using their mobile apps as business extension to advertise, market and sell their products they are amongst the highest earning groups in digital health. In our new survey “Medtech’s role in the Internet of Medical Things” we want to find out more about connected medical device manufacturers.

Only 11% of all digital health practitioners are realizing a revenue of 1 million USD or more per year with their whole app portfolio – whilst they have an average size of 1,500 employees. Medical device companies are amongst the highest earners in digital healthcare, only IT/tech companies are achieving higher revenue.

We are conducting a short survey on the topic of connected medical devices. So, let’s have a closer look on medical device companies.

American & big

In terms of company size medical device companies are bigger than average. Whilst the company size for digital health companies is 1,600 employees, medical device companies are 2,200 employees in size. More than one quarter of medical device companies (27%) has more than 5,000 employees.

Medical device manufacturers are far above average located in North America (53% vs. 36% on average). In return, in all other regions/ continents medical device manufacturers are underrepresented.

Expensive app development

The average costs for an mHealth app until launch are $425,000. The app development costs of medical device manufacturers are roughly 1,5 times above average.

In terms of spending for outsourced development and outsourced marketing medical device manufacturers are spending a little bit below average for the first and a little bit above for the latter.

The return on investment in terms of download numbers and monthly active users for medical device manufacturers is in line with the average mHealth app publishers: 300,000 downloads for the whole app portfolio per year and 29,000 MAUs.

The main revenue stream for medical device manufacturers comes – not very surprisingly– from selling devices through their apps, and also licensing and service sales.

Average connectivity, but high integration of electronic health records

One reason why mobile app development for medical device manufacturers is more expensive is their above-average integration of electronic health records (EHR). In the digital health industry 37% of app publishers integrate electronic health records into their apps. Medical device manufacturing companies are integrating EHRs to a much higher percentage (45%).

In the process of developing apps for healthcare the step/ task of EHR integration is by far the biggest cost driver.

In terms of other forms of “connectivity” like offering an API to their apps, connecting to 3rd party API aggregation services or connecting to sensors and wearables medical device manufacturers are in line with the average mHealth app publisher.

Let’s find out more: new survey

As part of our mHealth Economics program we’re conducting a short survey on the topic of connected medical devices: The survey is done in cooperation with our research partner Deloitte. It examines industry challenges like market challenges, partnership opportunities, data utilization as well as the impact on future business.

If you’re working in the field of connected medical devices*, please feel free to participate.

Every survey participant will:

  • get insights into connected devices market. The findings from the survey will be published at the end of May.
  • participate at a launch event or an interactive webinar presenting the survey results.

Click here to start the 5-10 minutes survey:

* Definition of connected medical device for this research: A device with a medical purpose that connects to another mobile device, machine and/or internet. Connected devices that support fitness or wellness use cases are not in the scope of this research.

If you have already participated: Thank you. Please forward this link to colleagues this might be interesting for.

Feel free to share the survey with your colleagues.

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