Faster alone, further together.
Well, not so fast.
Is alone really the way to go fast? Especially in the emerging medtech market with the outcomes to date with certain technology platforms.
Billions of dollars have been poured into large format soft tissue robotics platforms by a few of the strategics. Attempting to go it alone.
There are a number of phases in the journey that are an order of magnitude more challenging than the previous phase:
– Getting a large format soft tissue robotic platform to a prototype stage
– Getting the system through Verification & Validation
– Getting clearance/ approval through the FDA
– Having the staff who is excellent at building, selling, and installing 20 of them
– Having the staff who is world class at building, selling, and installing 100 of them
– Maintaining and retaining a very large, talented R&D team that is world class at robotics, controls, UI/UK, cloud, data analytics after the product is launched because that is only the beginning of the journey.
The last point on maintaining a large talented R&D team for the strategics who are attempting to put out a large format, soft tissue robot is a non-native mindset as much as they are a non-native digitally culture company in their current state.
Most medical devices that have been brought to market by the large strategics are analog devices, that are accustomed to either buying the technology, so the native tribal knowledge generally does not come along with the acquisition.
In the rare cases that the tech has been developed in house within the large strategic, the R&D is heavy up front and rapidly trails off after passing through the FDA and heads to launch.
This is not the case with highly complex, large format soft tissue robotics. The launch of the product is just the beginning of the journey, the pressure to deliver from ongoing R&D is insanely high as we espouse the value of data, clinical advisement, UI/UK, visualization improvements, telehealth capabilities, and on and on.
For reference, check Intuitive‘s annual R&D spend for 2022 which was nearly $900M.
The large strategics are generalists and not deep domain experts in these areas. And that is OK.
The strategics will ultimately come to the conclusion that they should form business partnerships as digital and robotic system aggregators and partners and take advantage of their strengths and go resist trying to be everything to everyone.
The large strategics are great at:
– Distribution
– Bundling and leveraging existing contracts in place
– KOL access
– Marketing
– Access to customer, provider, patient
– Financial reserves for large initiatives for launch or acquisitions
It is better for the strategics, peoples career opportunities will be more robust and stable, startups will have enhanced exit pathways, new revenue models will emerge, the providers and the patients will get the solutions they need and deserve.
