Bringing 3D Bioprinting to the Market; Agile marketing, rapid product development and strategic alliances

Abstract: 3D bioprinting technology is an emerging technology with a potential to revolutionize the medical field as it has a capability to biofabricate living tissue and organs using a patient’s own cells in conjunction with different biomaterials. This disruptive technology is in an early stage and innovators and early adopters stepwise improve the performance of the technology as it continuously grow. The first official 3D bioprinting company, Organovo from the USA, found their niche market in providing pharmaceutical companies with human tissue on demand that can be used for drug screening applications. This thesis describes a novel model used for bringing 3D bioprinting to the market, disrupting the current market established by Organovo. CELLINK AB, which is the first company in the world to commercialize a universal bioink for bioprinting of human tissue, has realized that successful commercialization stems from the creation of a system of products, rather than single products. Such system includes the commercialization of 3D Bioprinters, bioinks, consumables, and even bioprinting services for educational use. Providing bioprinters and bioink require, however, that the demand for such goods and services grows simultaneously. The strategic alliances with material suppliers and partnership with cell supplier played an important role in paving the path to market for CELLINK. The missing link, such as lack of CAD files of human tissue and organs, has been filled by creating an open source community, namely “Bioverse”. CELLINK, a start-up company found their niche by becoming the first 3D bioprinting company in the word that provides the whole introduction package to 3D bioprinting for innovators and early adopters. Agile marketing, rapid product development and strategic alliances were keys to CELLINK’s success. CELLINK is currently positioned in a rapid expansion stage and must focus heavily on R&D, sales and marketing to maintain its market shares and continue the growth. The following case study is an analysis using the Knowledge Intensive Entrepreneurship, KIE conceptual model (McKelvey, Lassen, 2013).