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August 04, 2020 | Tom Ballard

Winter Innovations completes first production build of EasyWhip™ needles

Great news for Winter Innovations as noted on social media. The company announced that it had completed its first production build of EasyWhip™ needles at its contract manufacturer.

“It has been incredibly rewarding and humbling to see how much work goes into making a final, finished medical device,” Co-Founder Lia Winter wrote, noting the process involved at least 20 different steps to transform raw materials into packaged EasyWhip™ needles. “We are so thankful to the people who have helped us with product development along the way (Andy Fronk, Brian Young, Olaf Schulz, Sherry Abel, and Tammie Powell).

The company was launched during her time at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and is focused on commercializing the needle for orthopedic procedures. In the social media post, the Winter Innovations team also expressed gratitude to Design Concepts and Enterprises for helping the company progress from its first rough engineering drawings to production in just one year.

“During our visit for the build, we didn’t just get to observe the production process, we were trained and had the opportunity to participate in the cleanroom assembly line,” Winter wrote, including this picture with Co-Founder Preston Dishner. “One piece of advice that I would give to start-ups that produce a physical product is take time to get to know your suppliers and manufactures. After spending three days at Design Concepts, these people feel like part of our team, and we have already begun collaborating on ways to improve and expand the EasyWhip™ production process.”

As noted in this recent teknovation.biz article, Winter Innovations is a participant in the 2020 “Tampa Bay Wave TechDiversity Accelerator.” The cohort will be pitching in a virtual event beginning at 5:30 p.m. August 20. If you are interested in watching, click here for registration information.


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