From lab to fab: overcoming the design–manufacture divide in microfluidic product development

Microfluidic technologies underpin many advances in diagnostics and life-science tools, yet only a minority of laboratory concepts survive the transition to manufacturable products. Drawing on development experience across multiple industry-facing projects within the Microfluidics Innovation Hub, we identify the recurring reasons for this gap: weak market definition, over-integrated device architectures, early design choices misaligned with scalable materials and processes, and manufacturing workflows that become unnecessarily complex. These issues are often amplified when teams approach product development with a laboratory mindset rather than a product mindset. This Perspective distils a practical framework—spanning user alignment, design discipline, manufacturability, and supply-chain strategy—to help researchers and founders anticipate translational pitfalls and develop microfluidic systems capable of succeeding beyond the lab. We argue that successful translation requires early convergence of market definition, constrained system design, and manufacturable architectures, supported by development strategies that treat manufacturing and regulatory realities as primary design inputs rather than downstream optimisation challenges.