Marketing of Innovations for startups in Med Tech: an illustrative case of Discovery-driven planning for Resolve

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis is to illustrate how the methodology of discovery-driven planning can be applied to the business development strategy of innovative startups in the Med Tech industry. Given the characteristics of this field, this framework, which is normally used to determine a positive or negative decision on the undertaking of big new projects on behalf of already established companies in the same kind of volatile and unpredictable environment, can be ideal to take the role of guidance for the business development of innovative startups. Discovery-driven planning is a powerful tool based on flexibility of business development and continuously acquired new knowledge that can be used for the specific development or go/no-go decision of an initial idea, which is revised at each milestone (with the relative minimized investments) as well as demonstrating the worth of a project (or entire newly established company such as a startup) to external stakeholders. The basis of this entrepreneurial method is exactly the one that deep tech startups in their early stage must face: a volatile and unpredictable environment, in which decisions are based on assumptions and not on confirmed knowledge with a need for minimizing the initial use of resources. The paper focuses on the case of Resolve, a French startup that has developed an innovative neuro-imaging device for stroke detection operating in the MedTech industry and currently in the seed funding phase, which is used as an illustrative case for the implementation of such a technique.