Tiger Buford, an orthopedic recruiter, says 90% of device companies are ordinary and don't innovate. He lays out nine emerging technologies, from AI to additive manufacturing, that any firm can use to break out. His concrete fix: assemble a small cross-functional team, give them a budget and autonomy, and task them with solving one specific clinical problem.
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Brought to you by Tiger Buford. Hello, orthopedic peers. Welcome to Inside Orthopedics. My name is Tiger. I'm an orthopedic industry insider and retained recruiter for emerging orthopedic companies You may be driving, traveling, working, or at home. Thank you for listening. This is episode number 4, another short one. The title is "An Open Letter to Orthopedic Companies." I'll get right into it. I have to voice my opinion. The majority of orthopedic companies are simply not innovators. It's time for somebody to stand up and say that 90% of orthopedic companies are just ordinary. You see this at any trade show. So I challenge you to be remarkable, to swing for the fences, be differentiated, own a monopoly in your niche, dictate your own pricing. Have customers pull your products instead of pushing them out through salespeople. Make investors fight over funding for your innovation. Control your destiny. Please don't be that company pursuing incremental changes, a different angle here, a new coating there. You know who I'm talking about. We all see them. As a recruiter in the space, I get frustrated watching the 90% of orthopedic companies fail to innovate, and that's why I choose to work with the 10%. So it's 2019. There's really no excuse for an orthopedic company to be ordinary. New technology is erupting all around us. Any orthopedic company can exploit these technology gifts out there for us. Additive manufacturing has brought us a new design paradigm. Uh, new implant materials are being invented that can literally morph into bone. Virtual reality surgical training is better, cheaper, and can scale globally. The Internet of Medical Things has enabled real-time communications between patients, implants, healthcare providers, etc. Device-to-device communication will dwarf human-to-human communication in the near future. Genomics has advanced so far— fast that each patient will receive a slightly different treatment to solve their musculoskeletal problem. Sensors and wearables will revolutionize how we collect and analyze clinical results. AI will bring faster and more accurate diagnoses in orthopedics. AR/VR will improve complex surgeries in the short term, while robotics and AI may well be the killer surgery app in the long term. AI will initially make your sales force better, then AI will completely displace your sales force. Rep in the OR will be gone. Blockchain applications will completely redefine your supply chain and, and all financial transactions between payers, providers, and customers. So there's a lot going on and it's available to everybody. I beg you, stop being ordinary. Use these tools. In 2019 to innovate. Now, many of you may not know where to begin, so let me share some very specific advice. Here's some real actionable advice for any orthopedic leader who wants to create something remarkable. Select a few of your most creative people in your organization to work outside than normal boundaries. Maybe a handful of people from R&D, marketing, sales, throw in a surgeon. Now physically move them to a different location away from the groupthink and the meetings. Give the team a budget and permission to innovate. Then set them free to tackle a clinical problem that nobody else is working on. Be remarkable. That's, that's all you have to do. Thank you for listening. Please subscribe, and for more information, visit orthostreams.com.
