Medical Device 3PL: On-Time, Accurate, Cost-Efficient Logistics
When customers order your medical device products, they need faultless delivery on schedule. That’s because medical professionals may use your devices in operating rooms or in other life-enhancing—and even life-saving—ways. To successfully complete these orders, your business needs medical device 3PL (third party logistics) by a company that provides seamless fulfillment. Your business depends upon a 3PL logistic company that ensures product integrity every mile along the way, providing any specialized handling required and meeting short turnaround times.
NXTPoint is precisely that kind of medical device logistics company.
NXTPoint Solves 3PL Healthcare Logistics Challenges
A broad range of devices are used in modern medicine, coming in a significant range of types and sizes. When it’s time to ship some of them out of this large number of SKUs, we’ll smoothly locate those exact products out of our medical device warehouse, appropriately picking, packing, and transporting them. We also provide custom kitting and labeling, and we can operate at your in-house facilities as desired.
Plus, from the time devices are stored in our medical device warehouses through each portion of transportation, we’ll make sure that temperature-sensitive devices are kept in the optimal environment.
Then, there’s the regulatory environment. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulates the medical device industry, designating a device as Class I, Class II, or Class III. They classify them by the amount of effort it requires to keep them safe and fully operational. The NXTPoint team is knowledgeable about these distinctions, and our logistics firm is appropriately certified to manage and deliver the spectrum of devices.
Medical Device 3PL Expertise and Outstanding Levels of Service
From having the right permits to maintaining the best environments in our medical device warehouse to carefully planning transportation routes, NXTPoint is prepared to provide flawless medical device logistics. We fully recognize the value of immaculate product management and delivery, so our expert team also has backup plans in place to ensure that medical teams receive their crucial shipments on time. We know how patient health and wellbeing are at stake.
When products get recalled, our 3PL healthcare logistics team will efficiently engage in reverse logistics, returning or disposing of devices according to instructions. We also place high priority on risk management along each step of the logistics process.
Additionally, we realize the importance of transparency, providing start to finish visibility in the 3PL healthcare logistics’ supply chain. This includes during the secure storage of inventory in our medical device warehouse space and during our flexible, compliant inventory management. We’ll also expertly monitor quantities of products in our warehousing to help ensure availability.
Then, we’ll efficiently ship your inventory, offering data-driven analytics that allow you to proactively pinpoint any potential disruptions, addressing them before they take place. Plus, our cutting-edge software allows you to know where shipments are located in real time.
Domestic and International Medical Device Logistics
Our dependable domestic transportation includes both full truckload shipping and less-than-truckload shipping for a complete range of available efficiencies. We also offer a large range of value-added services that lower complexities while reducing resource cost across the supply chain.
Our international transportation management allows you to proceed confidently with NXTPoint—no matter what corner of the world needs your life-enhancing medical devices. You’ll have smooth access to all shipping documents with a single point of contact handling your shipment from beginning to end.
No matter where you’re shipping, NXTPoint is your responsive logistics partner, solving challenges and strengthening your supply chain from the first to the last mile. Our experience, high levels of competence, and flexibility assures you that your valuable medical devices are handled, managed, and shipped with minimum risk to arrive on time and within budget.
Global Medical Device Manufacturer Case Study
This manufacturer required a robust medical devices 3PL solution that dovetailed with its workflow, managed their inventory overflow, and met long-term supply and demand without disrupting employees.
For more than a decade, we’ve helped this medical device company navigate unexpectedly high consumer demand throughout our medical device warehouse space and value-added services. Our experts designed an optimal inventory system that maximized flow, relieving potential stopgaps in productions.
Our innovative tier-1 warehouse management system, Körber, provides full visibility into inventory levels, incoming shipment requests, and order fulfillments. The system allows the company to rapidly adapt to meet market needs.
Choose NXTPoint Logistics for Your Medical 3PL Logistics
NXTPoint provides customized solutions for each of our customers, helping each one to strengthen the resiliency of their unique supply chains to meet market needs and stay ahead of the competition.
We provide the highest levels of care and risk mitigation using proven processes and methodologies. NXTPoint prioritizes health, quality, and safety performances, proactively anticipating your needs. Consult with a member of our expert team!
Case Study
Dedicated warehousing of raw materials, onsite personnel, and country-specific repackaging helped this medical device manufacturer adjust to supply shortages and limited transportation capacity. See how NXTPoint Logistics’ exclusive medical supply logistics solution evolved their supply chain.
Medical Device 3PL FAQs
The supply chain for medical devices can be quite complex because of the wide range of devices involved and their product-specific requirements, the time-sensitive nature of many of them, and the importance of timely deliveries for patient health.
The supply chain should always begin with careful planning. Then, depending upon specifics, it can involve the transportation of raw materials to a manufacturing site to build the devices. The finished devices can then be transported to warehouses and distribution centers where they are inventoried and stored. This may involve cold storage in warehouses and during transportation. Then, when needed, they get transported to hospitals and other medical facilities, retail locations, and so forth, ultimately getting them into the hands of end users.
According to the National Institutions of Health, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration defines “medical devices” as “any object or component used in the diagnosis, treatment, prevention, or cure of medical conditions or diseases, or that affects body structure or function through means other than chemical or metabolic reaction in humans or animals. This broad definition includes a huge range of products, ranging from tongue depressors to computerized tomography scanners.”
Next up: “3PL” is shorthand for “third party logistics.” It describes the process in which a company outsources its logistics to an expert third party like NXTPoint. This allows the company to benefit from a strengthened supply chain while freeing up time and other resources to focus on core competencies and business growth.
Put these two definitions together, and you have “medical device 3PL”: third party logistics for medical device products.
Medical devices fulfill a variety of purposes as they help to improve people’s health and lives. So, it’s important to efficiently and cost effectively get the devices where they need to go, safely, on time, and in excellent condition. This is exactly what our healthcare logistics experts do, providing broad and niche expertise and outstanding value for our customers and strengthening their supply chain.
Besides the efficiency provided, our medical 3PL services can save you money. First, you won’t have to pay for your own in-house fulfillment facilities and associated labor any more. Instead, you’ll benefit from economies of scale with NXTPoint along with our volume rate discounts and cost-sharing strategies. As just one example, you can benefit from shared warehousing for your medical 3PL.
With NXTPoint, you don’t have to worry about volume guarantees or long-term commitments. They aren’t required. Instead, we flexibly move with you as demand spikes or lulls—whether that happens seasonally or for other reasons. You can leverage our significant network to expand into new markets with your devices, nationally and internationally.
When you choose NXTPoint for your medical 3PL, you benefit from risk mitigation because of our well-established routes, contingency plans, and natural disaster-related initiatives. Thanks to our advanced proprietary technology, you will enjoy high visibility into your supply chain in real time, facilitating better decision making and giving you peace of mind.
Throughout the entire process, our professional team will handle your medical devices with care and treat your customers with respect, serving as a positive extension of your brand. To discuss how NXTPoint can make a difference in your supply chain, please contact us online for a one-on-one consultation about our medical 3PL services.
NXT offers both shared and dedicated warehousing space for medical device companies, providing your company with scalable solutions of choice. Across warehouse options, you can benefit from our advanced warehouse technology and enhanced, streamlined inventory management for high transparency and more control while saving on operational costs. Benefits include climate-controlled space, advanced security, and delicate inventory handling.
This can be a complex process, requiring close adherence to governmental and healthcare regulations, temperature and handling requirements, and just-in-time fulfillment. The medical devices, upon request, are transported from the manufacturer or medical grade warehousing facilities to hospitals and other healthcare facilities or other establishments.
The best fulfillment stays in close compliance across the supply chain, doing so efficiently and cost effectively from the first until the last mile. Success requires quality communication and collaboration and precise demand forecasting and management for just-in-time deliveries.
NXTPoint accomplishes all of this and more, using advanced technology for maximum, real-time visibility while providing top-notch service.
NXTPoint smoothly matches shippers who need to transport medical devices with carriers with the appropriate capacity, creating mutually beneficial partnerships. Our extensive experience and large network allows us to rapidly respond to fulfill needs, going the extra mile to ensure that all boxes are checked off, staying in compliance even as regulations evolve.
One global medical device company needed a flexible logistics solution that would dovetail with its operational flow, deal with inventory overflow, avoid disruption, and serve as a long-term supply and demand solution. The company prioritized their need to address labor and raw materials shortages and uneven transportation capacity.
NXTPoint has worked in collaboration with this global medical device company for more than a decade, focusing on optimizing raw materials delivery, receiving processes and warehousing capacities, waste removal, shredding and recycling, and case conversion and labeling. Our strategy included taking over full management of the global medical device company’s on-site facility, and we have had to redesign the solution when consumer demand unexpectedly grew. You can find more details in our medical 3PL case study.
NXTPoint leverages more than one hundred years of logistics experience as we design and implement flexible medical device 3PL programs. Plus, we offer a full range of logistics services to provide complete solutions, maintain a deep and wide freight broker network to smoothly solve supply and demand challenges, and use advanced technology to provide you with real-time insights into the progress of your medical device cargo: our Tier-1 Enterprise Warehouse Management System (WMS), Körber One, provides maximum visibility and tracking. Add-on services include raw materials handling, labeling, kitting, returns management, and more.
When you choose our highly skilled team for your logistics, you’ll benefit from the extensive resources that are typically found in large logistics companies along with the responsiveness, adaptiveness, and personalized service of smaller firms. Another way you’ll benefit: we own and operate about three dozen state of the art distribution facilities and collaborate with trusted partners across the country for seamless supply chain operations. Our efficiency and flexibility, plus our cost-efficient strategies, help you to compete in challenging markets. At NXTPoint, you never need to make volume guarantees or long-term commitments.
Reach out today for a consultation call with our experts. We can design a customized program for your specific requirements.
We start with a one-on-one consultative call in which you can share your supply chain needs, challenges, and goals. We’ll then share a professional plan that’s tailored specifically for your company.
