Elcam Safety
Elcam Drug Delivery Devices
From Sales Management to Product Mastery: Meet Catalina Gutman
Years spent in sales gave Catalina something no document or dashboard can fully capture: a deep understanding of what customers care about, where friction shows up, and which product details truly matter. Today, as Product Manager for stopcocks and manifolds at Elcam Medical, she brings that frontline insight directly into product development, turning conversations into better decisions.
Starting in sales provided her with an intimate understanding of what customers are looking for, the features that matter most to them, and their key concerns. Transitioning to product management meant approaching these same challenges from a different angle, with the power to shape solutions that address real-world needs.
Stopcocks, Manifolds, and More
Catalina has her finger on the pulse of every aspect of Elcam’s stopcocks and manifolds, being deeply involved in the product journey right from inception and all the way to the OEM customers.
Products can be born in two ways: from customer-specific customization projects or from the annual roadmap. When customers approach Elcam with customization requests, the product manager serves as the interface between them and Elcam’s development team.
“I’m the interface between the customer and Elcam to develop the project,” Catalina explains. “The process includes comprehensive evaluation at multiple levels—from technical feasibility to strategic value—ensuring that customization projects align with both customer needs and the company’s capabilities and standards.”
Customization: The Reality Catalina Gutman leads Elcam’s stopcocks & manifolds with one goal: turning real customer needs into safe, compliant, life-impacting solutions.
“Even small changes can be complex to implement,” says Catalina. “We must comply with ISO standards, DMR requirements, and all applicable global regulations. The validation process involves assembling teams of manufacturing engineers, development engineers, and quality engineers.”
Customization requests can range from changes to dimensions, raw materials, and handle positions to modifications in port sizes—all tailored to fit a customer’s specific equipment or sterilization processes. While these changes may seem straightforward, each modification must meet rigorous global regulatory standards.
Every customization project requires comprehensive documentation to support regulatory compliance and audit readiness. This commitment to validation means that when Elcam delivers a customized solution, customers can be confident they’re receiving a product engineered to their specifications without compromising on quality or safety.
Beyond the Launch: Owning The Full Product Lifecycle
The product manager’s responsibility extends far beyond managing customization requests. The role involves the entire lifecycle of Elcam’s stopcocks—from birth until they’re discontinued. This includes monitoring sales performance, managing costs, handling quality issues, and making strategic decisions about pricing and production methods.
“I’m responsible for everything from when products are born until their life ends,” Catalina notes. Every year, the team evaluates whether the company is manufacturing products correctly—are they using automation effectively? Can they reduce costs? Do they need to adjust pricing to increase sales or reflect their value? The product manager also works closely with the quality control team when issues arise, diving into what happened and how to address it.
Once a year, the product management team develops the annual roadmap, selecting one or two new initiatives based on resource constraints and market opportunities. They look for products they can proactively bring to market rather than waiting for customer requests.
The Challenge of Building What Already Exists
“This is the most challenging aspect of my role,” Catalina admits. “Stopcocks are established products. Finding truly innovative additions to the portfolio requires creativity. It’s not just about responding to customer requests, but more about anticipating needs and identifying opportunities before customers even ask.”
Her strengths in this role come from her years of experience at Elcam. She knows the stopcocks intimately, understands the processes and procedures, and knows how things work within the organization.
This complex job does come with an upside for Catalina: The human connections. “While traveling can be demanding, I love being face-to-face with customers, discussing products and understanding their needs,” she says. “The real satisfaction comes when customers approach me with a problem, and I know how to help them solve it or improve their processes. Helping customers get what they truly need and watching them grow their business. That’s what drives me.”
When Customer Insight Drives Product Innovation
Catalina’s pro-active approach to development often drives innovations that stem from market trends and changes, keeping customer needs at the top of her mind always. After observing other market players successfully introduce a three-in-one stopcock configuration, she recognized an opportunity for Elcam.
She’s currently working on configurations that combine multiple stopcock features into integrated solutions: “I’m playing with the configurations we have—combining features from different products to create solutions that give customers more flexibility based on their specific usage needs,” she says.
One project Catalina is particularly passionate about is the Snap Manifold, currently in development. Following customer feedback about their assembly processes, she’s spearheading an innovative snap-together system that eliminates the need for heat and adhesives in Large Board manifold assembly. The new Snap Manifold design allows stopcocks to simply snap together—no oven, no glue, just a secure snap-fit assembly. This advancement responds to customer needs for simplified assembly while maintaining the same high-quality standards. The product is being finalized for launch later this year year.
The Marvelous Factor
Catalina’s favorite product? Marvelous. With proprietary flow-channel technology and continuous in-line flushing, it leaves virtually no residual volume—eliminating syringe flushing, reducing procedure time, and lowering infection risk for healthcare professionals and patients. What makes this product extra marvelous is its clinical impact: Healthcare providers don’t need to use syringes to clear the device, so it significantly reduces procedure time and eliminates potential infection sources.
Why Customers Choose Elcam
When customers ask why they should choose Elcam, Catalina focuses on three key differentiators.
- There’s a significant quality difference. With many lower-cost stopcocks, you can easily pull the handle out of the body with minimal force. While some competitors are investing more in quality, the gap remains substantial. Elcam’s products are built to exacting standards.
- Support and compliance. The company maintains comprehensive documentation for global regulatory compliance—ISO standards, DMR requirements, and all necessary certifications. When customers need documentation for registrations or submissions, Elcam has everything ready. The company is transitioning all materials to medical-grade plastics to meet evolving requirements.
- The human element. “I always ask customers: if it were your mother or your children connected to a stopcock, would you want them on something chosen purely for price, or something you can trust? The price difference is cents, not tens of dollars. That piece of plastic has a large factory behind it working to ensure it’s the best for its intended use.”
Additionally, at Elcam, customers can source multiple products from a single trusted supplier. Whether they need stopcocks, manifolds, or other infusion components, Elcam offers comprehensive solutions from one house. For the right applications—such as intensive care patients who need multiple access points and may be ambulatory—the benefits of products like Marvelous become even more apparent.
When Product Decisions Impact Real Lives
At Elcam, product management isn’t just about specifications, cost, or compliance, though all three matter deeply. It’s about responsibility.
Behind every stopcock is a system, a team, and a set of decisions that ultimately affect patient safety. “We’re not just manufacturing plastic components,” Catalina says. “We’re responsible for the people connected to them.”
That perspective is what defines both Catalina’s role and Elcam’s approach: Care that shows up in the details, long before the product ever reaches the clinic.
