St. John’s-based PolyUnity Tech, which uses agile manufacturing to make products rapidly for hospitals, has been named the CAN Health Network’s Company of the Year, which it hopes will help attract investors and clients.

PolyUnity works with hospitals – mainly in Newfoundland and Labrador and Ontario, so far – to understand products they need quickly, then manufactures those products to suit the hospitals’ specific requirements. As well as making new products – all of which require no or minimal regulatory approval – the company helps healthcare organizations repair a wide range of equipment, to help avoid bottlenecks in the system.

The company has worked closely with Newfoundland and Labrador Health Services, or NLHS, the recently amalgamated health authority in the province. That relationship has helped PolyUnity to grow within the CAN Health Network, which is a partnership of leading healthcare organizations across the country, and now the Network has recognized PolyUnity as its Company of the Year.

“It’s incredible,” said CEO Jacqueline Lee in a phone interview conducted from the sidelines of the TechNL Innovation Week in St. John’s on Wednesday. “It’s been a long and challenging road, for sure, trying to break into and sell into the public health sector in Canada. . . . We have validated what we do and now we’ve been recognized nationally for our work.”

PolyUnity was formed four years ago by three Memorial University med students to 3D print medical simulation models. They aimed to let medical professionals anywhere in the world download these designs from the company’s website, then 3D-print them for use in training.

As the pandemic ended and global supply chains seized up, the company learned from healthcare providers that they faced an even more pressing needs. Some basic products were scarce or unattainable, and hospitals needed to work with a provider that understood their needs to manufacture them. PolyUnity pivoted to solve this problem.

Lee – who joined the company as its CEO two years ago – cited as an example the trays needed to transport COVID-19 vaccines from central storage units to frontline healthcare sites. These vaccines had to be stored at freezing temperatures in mass volumes, then transported in safe trays to scattered sites. PolyUnity prototyped the product and got the trays out in a few weeks, and they were used throughout Newfoundland and Labrador’s successful vaccination program.

Asked for a measure of how PolyUnity has grown, Lee said the company started with two employees four years ago and is now in the process of hiring its twentieth staff member. It has 17 staff in Newfoundland and three in Ontario.

As it tries to raise its first round of equity funding, the company is leveraging its networks to increase its reach within Canada. Being named the Company of the Year shows the inroads it is making with the Can Health Network, and PolyUnity is also developing ties with OBIO, the Ontario Bioscience Innovation Organization. It has also held discussions with health authorities in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

“By the fourth quarter of 2024, I’d say we should be in 15 hospitals in Canada,” said Lee, adding that the company is beginning to study the U.S. market.