Helping our Customers in The Fight Against COVID-19 is Personal for TIers

Helping our Customers in The Fight Against COVID-19 is Personal for TIers

"Are you having trouble breathing?"

Your smartphone app pings you with its daily check-in question.

But your healthcare providers already know how you're doing: They're monitoring your oxygen levels, pulse rate and other vital signs through new single-patient-use wearable technology that tracks respiratory illness anywhere, including in the comfort of your home. For hospitals taking careful measures to limit COVID-19 exposure among healthcare workers, patients and others, it's game-changing technology. The device leverages a tiny embedded chip from our company and snaps into a wristband to process vital sign data while patients shelter at home. It's one of the many solutions we're supporting to fight the pandemic.

Masimo, a global medical technology company based in Irvine, Calif., was already developing the technology when COVID-19 hit. Our company helped Masimo fast-track production so that it could be used to monitor patients with mild cases of the virus. "Patient monitoring with Masimo SafetyNet™ can help hospitals care for patients at home," said Bilal Muhsin, Chief Operating Officer of Masimo. "TI has helped us ramp up production and quickly get our solutions to the people who are helping on the front lines now, because the need is immediate.

'It's become a rallying cry for the team' Bert Brown wakes up at 3 a.m. to check on silicon wafers. For him, it's personal. The planning manager of DMOS5, one of our wafer fabrication factories in Dallas, has a daughter who works at a local hospital. This group of wafers for Masimo will play a critical role in technology that decreases the risk of COVID-19 infection for healthcare workers like her. It's an order he can't help but lose sleep over. "The faster we get these to the customer, the less personal protective equipment and hospital beds will be needed and the less risk the frontline healthcare workers face," he said. "It has become a rallying cry for the team." The rallying cry reached all the way to Clark, Philippines, where a skeleton crew expedited final wafer processing and closely monitored the order. As a result, processing time was reduced by 75% – a speed that's almost unheard of for the team.

To date, our company has shipped enough material for Masimo to create hundreds of thousands of monitors globally. "We realize that this is not just about meeting our commitment – we are playing a part in this pandemic," said Fersie Cabotaje, a manufacturing planner in Clark. "Our technology can help the world win this battle."

'A supplier with a sense of social responsibility'
Our customers around the world have seen demand soar for multiple technologies on the front lines of the COVID-19 response – including ventilators, oxygen concentrators, infrared thermometers, CT scanners and other medical equipment. As chest X-rays emerged as a frontline diagnostic imaging test for the virus, a biomedical electronics company in Shenzhen, China, needed help with emergency production of its equipment. Our company reacted fast to meet the increased demand, coordinate internal production and prioritize the need. The customer's medical equipment was manufactured and delivered quickly to hospitals in the area hardest hit by the coronavirus in China and Italy.

"With TI's support, Mindray produced and delivered medical equipment to the hospitals in the pandemic areas for patients' emergency treatment in time," said Minghe Cheng, president of Mindray. "We need a supplier with a sense of social responsibility like TI, and we expect your company to continue to support our production and make joint contributions to fight the pandemic." Will Qiu, sales manager for the account, said helping Mindray made him feel like he's made an individual contribution to the fight against the pandemic. "I want more TIers to realize the value of working in TI, and feel that we are not only doing our job, but also contributing to society," he said.

Screening for COVID-19 as economies re-open
As nations develop plans to re-open their economies, our customers have looked to our mmWave radar technology to develop mass screening devices, such as SymptomSense. The solution is designed to check hundreds of people per hour for virus symptoms. The sensor can quickly detect basic vital signs that could indicate illness, including heart rate and breathing rate. Meanwhile, our connectivity solutions are being used to better coordinate patient care. "Connectivity is playing a monumental role in the world right now," said Mattias Lange, general manager of our Connectivity business. "Transferring data through reliable, securely-enabled wireless connectivity allows medical professionals to quickly evaluate and diagnose a patient's condition, which is valuable information that could potentially slow the spread of the virus."

As our employees worldwide help medical equipment companies innovate and accelerate their solutions, they feel a sense of pride for helping create a better world through electronics. "Teams are working day and night," said Ajinder Singh, general manager, Medical sector, Systems Engineering & Marketing. "We are all in this together. It affects all of us. It's personal."

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