The rapidly emerging market for microminiature MIM medical components and the required technology for participation - Professor Randall German, San Diego State University, USA

The application of metal powder injection molding (MIM) to support minimally invasive dental and medical technologies is a potentially massive opportunity. Several efforts are in place to overcome the various technical barriers in production of very small, durable, and accepted components. In many cases these are building on progress in other fields, such as nanoscale powder synthesis and microminiature plastic molding.

A critical workshop has organized the current knowledge and identified technical needs. These R&D costs are large, so the barriers of time, personnel, talent, materials, equipment, and designs all must be worked simultaneously with the market development. Although a rapid growth area, microminiature MIM has little assessment on the barriers to becoming widespread for use in minimally invasive surgery. Some cost-benefit analysis will be discussed assuming all of the enabling technologies become available.