Identifying Innovation Opportunities in Robotic Bronchoscopy
A medical device leader facing increasing competition in robotic bronchoscopy needed clarity about where to innovate next.
I led an engagement spanning 15 hospitals and more than 30 interviews and case observations, helping engineering, design, and marketing unpack a clinically and technologically complex procedure and identify unmet needs, competitive gaps, and opportunities for differentiation.
The resulting opportunity framework established priorities and a shared strategic foundation for the organization’s next phase of product development.
Keywords: Opportunity Identification · Competitive Intelligence · Clinical Workflow · Human-Centered Discovery · Product Strategy · Surgical Robotics
Project Info
Client: A Major Medical Device Manufacturer
Time: 2020, 9 Months
Role: Engagement Lead, Strategist, Principal Investigator
Project Overview
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We began by bringing engineering, design, and marketing stakeholders together to clarify the business and product questions driving the engagement.
At the time, navigational bronchoscopy remained concentrated among leading centers of excellence, requiring us to understand sophisticated technology alongside clinical workflows, team dynamics, and procedural expertise.
I helped the organization surface existing assumptions and align around the questions that would provide greater clarity about where to focus next.
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I directed a qualitative program spanning fifteen hospitals and more than 30 interviews and case observations with physicians and support staff experienced in navigational bronchoscopy.
Including both customers and non-customers allowed us to understand the client’s existing experience alongside newer competitive offerings.
The work exposed how clinicians wanted to work, where current platforms created friction, and which aspects of emerging robotic experiences were beginning to establish new expectations.
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I guided the team in making sense of the relationships between clinical workflow, stakeholder needs, technology interactions, and experience gaps across a highly complex procedure.
Rather than treating individual pain points independently, we identified patterns across people, technology, workflow, and care delivery to understand where meaningful strategic gaps existed.
We translated those patterns into a stakeholder needs framework and opportunity areas that gave engineering, design, and marketing a shared view of where future innovation could create value.
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I worked with cross-functional stakeholders to connect the emerging opportunities to product and business priorities and determine which areas were most worthy of further exploration.
The work shifted the conversation beyond technical performance alone toward a broader understanding of workflow integration, team coordination, usability, and competitive differentiation.
The resulting opportunity framework created the strategic foundation for the organization’s next phase of development.
Key Takeaways
Understanding Procedural Choreography
Nurses, respiratory therapists, and physicians revealed that effective procedural teams operate as coordinated units rather than collections of individual users.
The strongest workflows allowed teams to move naturally from planning through setup and procedure without unnecessary disruption.
This exposed opportunities for future platforms to work with the choreography of the clinical team rather than requiring the team to accommodate the technology.
Looking Beyond Technical Performance
The client was highly capable at solving difficult technical problems, but competitive platforms were demonstrating that technical capability alone did not define a strong user experience.
Ease of setup, predictability, workflow integration, team coordination, and confidence in the system all shaped how clinicians evaluated the technology.
Making those dimensions visible broadened the organization’s view of what meaningful differentiation could look like.
Challenges
Unpacking Clinical and Technical Complexity
Navigational bronchoscopy combined sophisticated imaging, navigation, robotics, procedural workflow, and multidisciplinary clinical teamwork.
My role was to help the team create structure around that complexity without oversimplifying it, separating isolated problems from the larger relationships shaping the experience.
That ability to make a complicated system understandable was critical to identifying opportunities the organization could act on.
Maintaining Direction Through Constraints
The engagement took place in 2020, when access to hospitals and procedure rooms was highly constrained.
I guided the team in adapting the approach through virtual enactments and procedural walkthroughs while maintaining the strategic intent of the work.
This allowed us to preserve the depth needed for product and opportunity decisions despite significant limitations on access.