Addressing the challenge of an aging population through advanced co-creation

Philips has opened its first innovation co-creation center in Japan to help the country address the challenge of an aging population coupled with a falling birth rate. Located in the city of Sendai in the Tohoku region of Japan, an area renowned for innovation and forward thinking, the new site will bring together academia, clinicians, patients, industrial partners and policy makers to exploit digital healthcare innovation as a means of solving problems that will soon face much of the developed world.

Japan’s long life-expectancy, currently around 81 for males and 87 for females, together with a birth-rate that consistently falls short of that needed for sustained economic growth, means by 2025 it is estimated that around 30% of Japan’s population will be beyond retirement age. The figure is expected to reach 40% by 2060. As a result, the number of people requiring care for chronic age-related diseases will continue to increase, with insufficient tax revenues from working-age citizens to pay for it. Although severe, the problem is not unique to Japan.

“In partnership with Tohoku University Hospital, which already has on-campus co-creation activities with Philips, our new co-creation center in Sendai aims to accelerate research, development and commercialization of solutions relevant to the demographics and medical practice of Japan,” said Tsutsumi Hiroyuki, Market Leader Japan at Philips. “But with aging populations and falling birth rates set to become a global phenomenon, we believe the lessons learned will inevitably be much more widely applicable.” 

Philips’ co-creation center in Japan will work closely together with Philips’ global innovation hubs. By creating a stimulating environment for open innovation that actively encourages partners to drop in and brainstorm ideas, the aim is to facilitate the co-creation of new solutions that meet unmet patient needs and improve the quality and sustainability of healthcare delivery. Equipped with latest design aids, such as Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality, together with rapid prototyping facilities the hubs allow designers and end-users to come together in simulated real-world environments to experiment with new ideas and optimize solution performance.

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