Medical device startups can use all the help they can get, including from government-sponsored investment funds.
In Minnesota, one of the nation’s top three medtech hubs, the state Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) has been distributing $1.6 million per year since 2019 in innovation grants to tech startups — many of them in the medical device space.
“We also have $450,000 each year to provide that support to our startup community through education, helping those startups and entrepreneur innovators learn the know-how to start to scale their business,” said Neela Mollegard, director of the Launch MN entrepreneurship program at DEED, in an interview with Medical Design & Outsourcing. “We have connected Minnesota corner to corner, a hub-and-spoke model, representing higher ed to the private sector to government to entrepreneur support — incubators, accelerators — all working together to help these innovators s…