Medical equipment suppliers are optimistic about the national market

From May 13th to 15th, at the Plastics Congress for Medical Devices in the suburbs of Boston, Michael Corkran, founder and CEO of China Centric Associates, Inc., Beachwood, Ohio, United States, published his views on the Chinese medical market. China Centric is a consulting company that provides assistance to companies in developing and conducting business activities in China.

In its 2011-15 plan for five years, China has made improving the quality of medical care and expanding medical coverage the country’s top two priorities. Corkran said he expects health care to be listed as the top priority in the next five-year plan that began in 2016. In China, private for-profit hospitals are also an important growth market. Corkran said that in the past few years more than 2,000 such hospitals have been opened, most of them in large cities.

As China vigorously develops a domestic demand-oriented economy, it has opened the door for foreign companies to enter the local market. Corkran recommends that medical device manufacturers use opportunistic sales to meet customer needs when they open the Chinese market and sign contracts with local distributors, while focusing on strategic development planning.

He said: "The biggest mistake I've ever seen is trying to put a Western business practice on China, and I hope that it can work. Only in the past 15 years, the use of Western business practices in China will have some effect. ""

Although not as mature as the western competitors, the concept of intellectual property is particularly concerned. China established its first patent office in 1980, but China is catching up.

Corkran said: "Two-thirds of US companies complain that the alleged infringement is not at all. If you have an innovative idea but don't provide protection for it, that's your own business. China is taking very active measures. Similar intellectual property laws are being introduced in the West, and they want to protect their own intellectual property rights. But overcoming 2000 years of inertia in intellectual property rights will not be accomplished overnight."