Yvonne Loo, Regional Sales & Marketing Director, Easmed

The technological revolution has emerged as an empowering factor in the development of almost every sector. Similarly, the healthcare industry is facing numerous challenges in today’s dynamic business environment, be it clinical, nonclinical, or operational processes in hospitals. Thus, the industry is embracing digital transformation and making significant investments in processes and technologies to cut down costs, increase access to care delivery, and improve medical care. Acknowledging the current market position, many corporates as well as startups are climbing the stairways of digitization and transparency by providing innovative solutions to revolutionize the healthcare ecosystem. Incepted in 2006, Easmed is the leading distributor specializing in the fields of ENT, Sleep Medicine,Urology,and Respiratory Care in South-East Asia.

Evolving and Overcoming Challenges

Headquartered in Singapore, Easmed started with a core group of 4 employees dedicated to bringing new technologies and solutions to the ASEAN medical community. The company started successfully in the ENT specialty and expanded to many other specialties that have opened their minds to minimally invasive solutions.

In its initial years, the company chose a difficult path to bring innovative technologies. While there is clinical evidence in the western countries, adoption by the ASEAN doctors was generally slow. The company learned it quickly that education is the key to solving this hurdle and invested a lot of time and effort into providing training and proctorship opportunities for the early adaptors.

The company was limited to many factors such as least equipped, expensive cadavers, and lab costs, including lack of local faculty with experience to teach. Fortunately, the company had incredibly encouraging suppliers who supported them, and in return, Easmed returned the trust by training local teams to be proficient in their clinical knowledge, run future workshops independently, and also invested in the ancillary equipment needed such as High definition camera systems, surgical instruments, and microscopes.

Yvonne Loo, Regional Sales & Marketing Director of the company asserts, “Our team needs to know as much as our suppliers, be it in the product, application, or engineering troubleshooting knowledge. Our customers need to be adequately exposed to technology to a level of proficiency before using it on patients. This will create an ecosystem to sell innovation responsibly, not just successfully.” 

Cutting-Edge Technology and Innovation

With over 150 employees across 5 countries around the world, the company is introducing the latest technological advancements and products to the healthcare industry. As true healthcare IT innovator, Easmed introduced its medical device selection range from hardware such as cold steel instruments, nasal packaging to high-value items such as lasers, camera systems, and surgical robots. The organization provides software solutions for data recording, integration, and recently, telehealth medicine. The products are all selected based on their ability to fulfill current gaps in the medical industry or complementary to the portfolio to provide holistic solutions to the customers.

The company mainly has three sales divisions namely, ENT Neuro, Sleep & Airway, and Medsurg. Where, ENT Neuro cover solutions related to anatomy in the head and neck region, Sleep & Airway offers diagnosis and treatment of sleep and airway related respiratory disorders and Medsurg brings minimally invasive technology improvements to laparoscopy, arthroscopy, and surgical lasers.

Vision and Mission of the Company

Having 14 years of relationship with industry leaders, Easmed has become a reputable distributor for many strong international medical device brands, including Stryker, Lumenis, and Cook Medical and Resmed. Since its inception, Easmed’s philosophy has been on building value and trust to the customers and partners. It is devoted to helping patients better their lives and create a new future for healthcare through innovation and dedication. The company aims to develop committed personnel and provide the employees with the most conducive to enjoy and excel in their work.

As a Small Medium Enterprise distributor, the company is structured in a way that staff can learn and contribute fast if they have the capability and willingness to do so where opportunities are given to their internal staff before searching externally. It is a young and dynamic company, where more than 60% of its employees are less than 35 years old. Yvonnebelieves that this helped in the company being nimble and open-minded to internal technology adoption. In just over the last three years, the company has implemented ERP, CRM, LMS,e-leave management, and more than 5 apps on the company level to increase productivity. 

Humanity in the Time of Crisis

During the global pandemic of COVID-19, Easmed is taking precaution steps internally and externally. Internally, the company has laid out new rules to disinfect common use areas at higher frequencies and has had a series of communication to remind the staff of social distancing and hygiene. The staff is also equipped with goggles, face shields, surgical masks, N95, and thermometers.

Besides, the company sourced and supplied PPE to many organizations and the public. It has partnered with an organization that 3D prints ‘Ear Savers’ and distributes it to the healthcare workers. Along with that, the company is donating some of their earnings from the emergency PPE business to charity.

Envisioning Success

Easmed is grown organically over the past 14 years based on its strong people, process, and technology. The company wants to be seen as a partner who adds value to the medical community and continues to introduce new technologies and solutions. 

As a highly innovative company, Easmed looks forward to enhancing its education platform, Easmed Academy where ASEAN doctors can sign up for workshops and webinars to read about the latest innovations and search for medical device technology updates. The platform also aims to be utilized by the medical companies to reach out to the doctors for feedback and opinion. 

“Apart from having customers who appreciated our hard work, patients who benefited from our technologies, the most gratifying in this entire journey is that we have built next-generation leaders who feel the same passion in providing innovative solutions to better healthcare,” affirms Yvonne.