Japanese tech giant Canon has announced the opening of its second med tech-focused subsidiary in the U.S., with the first being Canon Medical Systems USA (CMSU).
The new subsidiary- Canon Healthcare- is expected to launch in January 2023 with a staff of 20 that will be led by Hisashi Tachizaki, as president. Tachizaki is currently serving as general manager and VP at Canon Medical Systems’ CT systems division. Moreover, Hiroyuki Fujita, the founder and CEO of Quality Electrodynamics, has been indefinitely asked to step in as chair for the new offshoot.
The factory and headquarters of Quality Electrodynamics (QED), a company that develops and manufactures MRI components, joined the Canon Group in 2019 and is based in Cleveland. The area is also considered a key hub in the U.S. healthcare industry, therefore, Canon is considering setting up their new healthcare unit here.
The company hopes that with this move they will be able to move up the global medical device industry. The expansion is phase 6 of Canon’s Excellent Global Corporation Plan, which aims to improve the company’s competitiveness within the medical component and diagnostic spaces. This includes CT, MRI, and diagnostic ultrasound systems. In addition to this, the company also aims to make strides in X-ray tubes and detectors, healthcare IT, and in vitro diagnostics. The new subsidiary is supposed to represent the company’s large-scale strategic transformation of its business portfolio.
Canon Healthcare U.S. will be taking on some of the marketing operations of its parent company and some product sales and service operations of the U.S. subsidiary of Canon Medical, CMSU. The company plans to increase its share of medical diagnostic systems in the American market by integrating operations with downstream marketing.
In terms of marketing operations, Canon Healthcare USA will build a network of medical institutions to help the company gather data on medical trends and pressing patient and clinician needs so that the tech giant may propose and develop new products and tools aimed at addressing current and future insufficiencies in healthcare.
For example, Canon will be teaming up with certain medical institutions to conduct research on the use of photon-counting detection modules in CT scanning technology that can late be used to rapidly launch new devices that will contribute to the company “capturing the No. 1 share of the global CT market at an early stage,” said Canon. If successful, the computed tomography will produce sharper images with lower radiation emissions.
When it comes to advanced technology research activities, Canon Healthcare U.S. will also be taking over its parent company’s existing research work with Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham Women’s Hospital at the Healthcare Optics Research Laboratory (HORL) in Boston. This research work has spanned over a decade and works to promote joint research aimed at commercialization.
Canon is also considering further growing U.S. based development and manufacturing capacities.
