Our recent fireside conversation with Christy Christian, Industry Principal for Life Sciences at Kinaxis, wasn’t really about semiconductors.
It was about something much larger.
While semiconductor shortages continue to challenge the MedTech industry, the discussion revealed that the companies navigating disruption most successfully aren’t necessarily the largest buyers. They’re the organizations that have rethought how they collaborate with suppliers, make decisions, and build resilience into their supply chains.
One of the most striking points discussed was the reality of MedTech’s position within the semiconductor ecosystem.
Medical device manufacturers represent only a small fraction of overall semiconductor demand. They aren’t competing against other MedTech companies, they’re competing against some of the largest technology companies in the world for supplier capacity.
That changes the conversation.
The question becomes less about how to buy more chips and more about how to become a customer suppliers want to prioritize.
Neither Scott nor Christy suggested that mid-sized companies can simply outspend larger competitors.
Instead, Christy introduced the idea of becoming a preferred customer.
Organizations that provide better forecasts, collaborate more effectively, communicate proactively, and demonstrate greater flexibility become easier for suppliers to work with. That relationship can influence supplier prioritization even when purchase volumes are relatively small.
Technology supports this objective, but trust, collaboration, and transparency ultimately strengthen supplier relationships.
One of the more interesting discussions centered on supplier diversification.
Historically, many MedTech companies have relied on single-source suppliers because regulatory approval makes qualifying multiple suppliers expensive and time-consuming.
Rather than waiting until disruption occurs, Christy suggested building optionality into products from the beginning. Qualifying secondary suppliers during product development may require additional investment upfront, but it creates flexibility when supply constraints inevitably emerge.
Resilience isn’t something organizations add during a crisis.
It’s something they’re designed to support.
For years, many organizations responded to uncertainty by increasing safety stock.
That strategy is becoming harder to justify.
Higher interest rates, expensive capital equipment, and increasing pressure on working capital mean excess inventory carries a much greater financial cost than it once did. Both Scott and Christy discussed how inventory optimization is becoming increasingly important as organizations look for alternatives to simply buffering against uncertainty.
Resilience today requires smarter inventory decisions, not simply larger inventory positions.
Perhaps the most compelling takeaway from the discussion was Christy’s perspective on decision latency.
Traditional supply chains operate sequentially. Information moves from one function to another, decisions wait for complete data, and organizations strive for perfect certainty before acting.
The challenge is that disruption rarely waits.
Christy argued that organizations need to become comfortable making informed decisions with approximately 80% confidence rather than waiting for 100% certainty. Modern planning technologies can help organizations evaluate scenarios more quickly, but they only create value if people are empowered to act on the information available.
In today’s environment, waiting for perfect information often becomes the greatest source of inefficiency.
One message came through consistently during the discussion.
The semiconductor challenge facing MedTech companies isn’t temporary. As supply chains become more interconnected and disruptions continue to emerge, organizations will need to rethink how they collaborate with suppliers, design products, optimize inventory, and make decisions.
Technology will continue to play an important role, but success will depend just as much on people, processes, governance, and organizational agility.
The companies that outperform won’t necessarily be those with the biggest purchasing power.
They’ll be the ones that become easier to work with, respond faster to change, and consistently make better decisions before their competitors do.
Want to hear the full discussion? Watch the fireside chat with Scott Spyker and Christy Christian as they explore why MedTech companies are losing the race for chips and what supply chain leaders can do about it. https://vimeo.com/1213633394?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci
