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Although the number of visitors dropped significantly compared to last year, the customers’ demand for quality products has given new hope to the exhibitors at Meditex Bangladesh Expo 2023.
They said the visitors were fond of essential medical devices like blood pressure and blood sugar level testing machines while the healthcare authorities--hospitals or diagnostics--were enquiring about biochemical testing items.
Meditex Expo, a perfect B2B platform for the medical and healthcare sector of Bangladesh, provided a perfect platform for manufacturers and distributors to have direct interaction with potential buyers of medical, surgical and hospital equipment of Bangladesh, organisers said.
It was the 14th version of expo and the second expo after the Covid pandemic held at International Convention City Bashundhara (ICCB) in the capital. The three-day expo concluded on Saturday.
Moshiur Rahman, Assistant Manager (Marketing and PR) of CEMS Bangladesh, said that the medical sector has seen huge investment in Bangladesh in recent years with a hope for further potential growth of the pharmaceutical industry.
The expo brought all healthcare products under an umbrella. Some 250 companies from 10 countries set up their stalls in the expo, he added.
Asked about their observations, he said the exhibitors participating in the event expressed their satisfaction with good response they received from the visitors. Due to heavy rainfall, fewer visitors came to the expo, he said.
“Last year we registered some 17,000 visitors that came down to nearly 12,000 this year. The estimation was as of 5pm, three hours before the end of the expo.”
Visitors were mostly enquiring about essential medical devices, diagnostic items, especially biochemical testing items, Rahman said.
Rakib Hosan, service engineer at JIST Life Care, said that they observed that most of the customers were asking for information about quality products with a call to ensure global certification of products.
Faruk Hussain, CEO of Creative Trade International, local partner of Pakistan-based surgical instrument manufacturer AIZ & Co, said that in the last couple of years, the government had been providing different facilities to medical and healthcare industries that make the people aware of the markets with facts and figures.
“We are having customers who have knowledge of what they want and can talk about advanced instruments as well that we have seen very less in previous times. The changes are coming but not in the fastest way,” he added.
Pasar Kumar Bhowmick, product manager of healthcare Diagnostic Solutions Limited who collaborated with several global brands like Abott and others, said that for the first time, they participated in the expo and got response which was out of expectations.
“All were inquiring about an automated urine chemistry analyzer named Laura. The machine can conduct 26 types of chemical (10) and microbiological (16) tests. This is for the first time, such a machine has been exhibited in the country,” he added.
People were showing interest in hematology testing machine, biochemical testing machine and Laura, Pasar said.
Managing Director of Transco Medical System Sohel Rana feels that medium level suppliers like him were not behaved well by the organisers. “If it continues further, many local small suppliers will not participate in the expo in future.”
In-vitro fertilisation dominates hospital tourism and services
One of the major segments of the expo was health tourism and medical centres from India and Malaysia which mostly targeted IVF treatment.
Naznin Ara was seen sitting at the CFC (Chennai fertility centre) stall. When asked, she said that she learnt from one of her relatives that CFC is better for such treatment.
