Associate Professor Gianni Renda makes history as the first medtech designer to be awarded a Researcher Exchange and Development within Industry (REDI) Fellowship

Department Chair of Architectural and Industrial Design, Associate Professor Gianni Renda, has been awarded a Researcher Exchange and Development within Industry (REDI) Fellowship in partnership with Swinburne and industry partner IDE Group, a design and engineering consultancy working across medical technology, including diagnostics, drug delivery, respiratory care, radiology, radiotherapy, surgical tools and equipment, wearable therapeutic, and diagnostic monitoring devices.

This is the first time a REDI Fellowship has been awarded to a medical technology designer. Associate Professor Renda has dedicated many years to investigating ways that design can empower the user in the field of health, disability, and ageing. His REDI Fellowship award acknowledges the important role that design plays in the use, uptake, and abandonment, of medical devices; whether that is an insulin pen used by an elderly diabetic or a specialist surgical tool by a highly trained doctor.  

As part of the Fellowship, Associate Professor Renda will undertake a 12-month project with IDE Group. IDE Group’s mission is to improve lives. Their cross-disciplinary team specialises in ideating solutions to complex problems and helping partners successfully navigate intellectual property issues and the commercialisation journey. Together with Eudaemon Technologies, Associate Professor Renda will help graduate designers understand how to best engage in the medical device development field, and how to bring user-centred design practices into a heavily regulated industry.  

Associate Professor Renda says this project is essential for creating a better tomorrow. “The project will arm design graduates with the knowledge of, and exposure to, the systems within a design-driven innovation context,” he said. 

“This kind of design process allows designers to contribute more meaningfully, and fully, to the medical device industry and further advance medical technology sectors in Victoria and Australia.” 

Group Director, Connected Care, IDE Group Andrea Ranzoni says IDE Group is proud to support Associate Professor Renda and the REDI Fellowship program to help create a training package for future entrepreneurs in the Medtech space. 

“Thanks to this program, our Fellow Associate Professor Renda will be able to articulate the importance and benefits of operating within a quality management system, with specific emphasis on how to integrate user-centred design principles in the early stages of medical device development.”  

The REDI Fellowship Program is part of MTPConnect’s $32 million Researcher Exchange and Development within Industry (REDI) initiative, funded by the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF). The REDI Fellowship program provides financial support to companies in the medical technology, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals (MTP) sector to bring researchers, clinicians and MTP professionals in-house for up to 12 months to work on priority medical research projects.