Groundbreaking Technology Enables Earlier Detection

Transformative growth requires strong partnerships

Founded over 30 years ago, Hologic’s groundbreaking products advance women’s health and well-being empowering women to experience healthier
lives. Their solutions diagnose and support the treatment of conditions across a range of specialties, including breast health, gynecological care, and  skeletal health. Their products are designed to deliver highly reliable results across both edge-centric and cloud-engaged platforms. As part of the product design and engineering process, the team expects and requires optimal hardware solutions, purpose built, for their software and solutions. In terms of customer support and providing seamlessly executing technology, Hologic also needs longevity and ideal hardware selection aligned with product design and function.

“Our goal is to improve health outcomes utilizing technology, education and market access," says Ryan Wallace, Chief Procurement Officer at Hologic. "To continuously enhance these standards, we need the right partners to collaborate on design agility and effectively build and scale the distribution of our systems throughout their extended lifecycle. Our time is best spent enhancing solutions, looking for early detection methods and delivering more medical breakthroughs.”

Focused on solving demanding needs

Pain points Hologic needed to address when looking for the ideal integration partner included:

Product Lifecycle Planning

• Assist and unify design paths amongst diverse product groups
• Support strategic & purposeful component selection
• Evaluate whitebox vs. branded options
• Evaluate product lifecycle & component transitions
• Analyze supply chain sustainability & alternate sourcing options
   

Scale and support

• Advice designing for manufacturability and serviceability
• Drive regulatory assessment & certifications
• Accelerate throughput through manufacturing standardization and test automation
• Aggregate & unify manufacturing and distribution - globally
   

Customizing the winning formula

Avnet Integrated Solutions was asked to help Hologic leverage the benefits of an optimized product design and global manufacturing scale. This would help Hologic streamline engineering, work through supply chain agility challenges, solve inventory liability mitigation, and procure the right hardware based on the optimal OEM supplier partner. Moreover, Avnet would need to be the central leader in pulling together Hologic’s engineering, procurement, regulatory, test, and service teams to optimize output.

It all starts with Avnet’s solution architects and technical support engineering team deploying an expansive technology selection process. Because of deep integration healthcare experience, Avnet’s technical experts already understood the needs of Hologic’s engineering and the need to focus on speed, accuracy, and reliability of the ideal hardware configurations. For Hologic, this also meant: utilizing existing platforms that meet cost, performance, functional, and sustainability needs, building custom designs and flexible platform configuration files internally as needed.

To collaborate and ensure Hologic’s products were positioned to scale from NPI throughout volume production, Avnet helped Hologic choose the best products based on performance, cost, lifecycle, and supply chain considerations. By moving to a consolidated compute approach and gaining leverage with a few concentrated suppliers, the team was able to gain better communication and roadmap visibility, and flexibility on supply.

Results that move the scale

Now, it was time to put the plan into action. Avnet played a pivotal role in streamlining communication across Hologic's divisions and product lines, reducing lifecycle management overhead while tracking and reporting LTB and EOL notifications. With this unified support transformation in place, Hologic was able to more readily scale by facilitating and compressing the time it takes for regulatory assessment and certifications, with fewer suppliers and products to track. 

“Avnet’s extensive integration experience, combined with ownership of their manufacturing facilities, gives them ultimate control over the entire development-to-distribution process," emphasized Lee Dodani, Sr. Strategic Sourcing Manager at Hologic. "We quickly realized they weren’t just managing our projects from a distance; they were addressing our challenges with the same hands-on approach we would take ourselves.”

Based on Avnet’s dedicated support and vested interest, Hologic decided to increase the production volume with Avnet Integrated Solutions in kind. “Hologic is a leading expert and incredible market leader in medical device solutions. To have Avnet join them and drive improvements in design, integration, supply, and services is proving to be a winning combination,” shared Mike Barry, Business Development Manager, Integrated Solutions.

Transformation complex healthcare solutions

Avnet understood the business need and partnership required by Hologic to enhance their next stage of development and growth. By working with a partner who was able to deliver solutions that supported their business model, Hologic was able to focus on their IP development and go-to-market strategies. This focus is key to keeping up with an increasingly complex and competitive global healthcare environment, driving continuous excellence and better health outcomes for all patients.