CEO Bryan Hanson said the company’s funnel for Rosa placements is the strongest it’s ever been and the surgical robotic system is expected to be a key growth driver for ZB in 2020.
The company that MD+DI editors recognized as the 2019 Medtech Company of the Year is off to a strong start in 2020, thanks in large part to its surgical robotics system for total knee replacements.
Zimmer Biomet (ZB) reported fourth-quarter 2019 knee sales of $761 million, representing 4.9% growth in the company’s knee business, and CEO Bryan Hanson said sales tied to the Rosa Total Knee System was a big part of that growth. And yet, Hanson said he’s still not completely satisfied with where the company’s knee business is at in terms of the overall market in knee surgery. He wants the company’s knee business to be able to outperform the overall maret.
“We’re not there yet,” Hanson said during the company’s 4Q19 earnings call this week, as transcribed by SeekingAlpha. “But the fact is we’re definitely seeing traction in base knee as well. It’s actually one of our best growth quarters in base knee that we’ve seen since the merge.”
That said, there was no denying the CEO’s enthusiasm during the call for the Rosa surgical robot.
“Rosa demand is very strong. We have … the largest funnel right now for placements that we’ve ever had,” Hanson said. “We’ve done over 2,000 procedures already. And again, we’re just a couple of quarters into this launch. So that would tell you that we’re really seeing acceleration of focus in this area.”
Perhaps the best indication of how well the robotic system is resonating in the field comes from what the company is hearing from surgeons who are performing knee replacement surgeries with Rosa.
“I had an opportunity to be out in the field and see a few cases, one particularly on the West Coast where I had a surgeon continue to look across the operating room and say, ‘I couldn’t do this before without Rosa’ [as the surgeon was making] half millimeter adjustments in tissue balancing and getting real-time feedback in the procedure,” Hanson said.
By Amanda Pedersen | MD+DI
Image Credit: Zimmer Biomet
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