MGS, a healthcare-focused contract development and manufacturing organization, has expanded its Hybrid Tooling capability worldwide after successfully deploying the approach alongside its A.i.r. Platform™. The company said the broader rollout is intended to help healthcare manufacturers accelerate product development, lower development risks and progress from concept to commercialization with greater confidence. The expanded offering is aimed at companies operating across the Pharma, Diagnostics and MedTech sectors that require earlier validation of product designs before committing to full-scale production tooling.
The company’s approach is designed to address the gap between conventional prototype development and final manufacturing. By combining aluminum prototype tooling with steel components in critical areas where tolerances, wear characteristics and material behavior are important, the process enables the production of injection-molded parts under conditions that closely resemble full-scale manufacturing. This allows customers to assess production readiness, material performance and tooling considerations earlier in the development cycle while maintaining the flexibility and speed associated with prototype programs.
“Healthcare companies are under increasing pressure to move quickly while minimizing development risk,” said Shawn Krenke, Chief Technology Officer at MGS. “Hybrid tooling helps customers validate designs earlier using representative manufacturing conditions without requiring an early investment in production-scale tooling. By expanding this capability globally, we’re bringing a proven development workflow to more customers around the world.”
According to MGS, traditional prototyping methods such as 3D printed tooling and aluminum tooling can rapidly generate sample parts but may not fully reproduce final production materials, manufacturing behavior or tolerances. While production tooling can provide those conditions, it often requires substantial upfront investment before designs have been completely validated. Through Hybrid Tooling, MGS aims to combine prototype-stage flexibility with production-representative performance, delivering molded components and manufacturing insights in as little as one month. The company said the capability can help accelerate development schedules, improve confidence in design decisions, identify manufacturing considerations earlier, reduce downstream production risks and support a more efficient transition to scalable manufacturing. MGS added that it continues to support Pharma, Diagnostics and MedTech customers through end-to-end development and manufacturing solutions intended to advance healthcare innovation.
