Taiwan medical devices company aims to make Thailand regional hub
APEX MEDICAL Corporation, a Taiwanese manufacturer of medical devices, plans to promote Thailand as its hub for CLMV (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam) and North Asia over the next three to five years.
“Thailand’s market has high potential and growth for the medical-devices segment. We also decided to establish a company in Thailand named Apex Medical Thailand via a joint venture with our distributor here,” company founder Daniel Lee said yesterday.
Apex medical devices were launched in Thailand about 20 years ago by Samaphan International Co.
Apex Medical Thailand, which is 49:51 owned by Apex and Samaphan, just started operating as Apex’s subsidiary in Thailand early this year.
The company says it is confident of hitting its annual sales target of Bt100 million within three years, as Thailand is a huge market for medical devices with sales of some Bt10 billion in all categories.
The country is well positioned geographically to be a regional hub, something supported by government policy, and it is an ageing society. So there are good reasons for Apex having its own profile here.
Apex is the market leader in Taiwan and distributes to 60 countries in Europe, the Americas and Asia.
It has subsidiaries in Britain, Spain, France, the United States, Panama, Egypt, Greater China including Shanghai, and now Thailand.
“We need to serve all of Thailand’s medical-device markets with good services, both sales and after-sales,” Lee said.
“Apex Medical Thailand will be our regional headquarters for North Asia in three to five years and needs to gain more market share.
“CLMV is an emerging market for every company to focus on. AEC [the Asean Economic Community] is a good opportunity for us in the future.”
Chinnakarn Samalapa, managing director of Samaphan International and Samaphan Health, said that while 20 years ago all products from Apex Medical Corp were imported by Samaphan International and distributed over the counter, the Thai market had high potential and grew every year, so Samaphan formed a joint venture with Apex Medical Corporation.
“We need to focus on the hospital channel and serve them with professional sales consultants, product knowledge and after-sales service.
“In the future we plan to penetrate the CLMV market.
“In the past we had only distribution, but from now on we’ll focus on after-sales service.
“The main market is the hospital channel. We will serve them with product knowledge and high-quality products.
“The medical-devices segment is highly competitive and in the same product line we have around 10 competitors, but we are confident that the quality of our products is high and can compete in the market. And all products have got US FDA [Food and Drug Administration] approval and the CE Mark.”
The product pipeline is focused on two categories –- air mattresses for wound management and CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) devices for respiratory therapy.
