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They don't need IREP, they just need to downsize the daVinci concept. There are a lot of smart engineers out there.
All I want is a little updated company news: who is going to a conference, a new hire, a change on the SAB, moving offices, just some general news to tell me that things are happening week-to-week.
Clearly they feel that kind of information is a waste of time to disseminate.
I'm not sure it is paranoia on their part, but allowing the pps to droop and founder has never made sense to me. If anything, they should be keeping some sort of active profile in the marketplace to seed the market. Maybe they have a different philosophy.
Hopefully, their "apparent confidence" is based on reality and they are just busy as bees and going to make a big reveal. Time is strongly against them now, in my opinion. This survey by ISRG should be a wakeup call that they need to move development along with an eye to how they will need to enter the marketplace. Waiting until everything is perfect may take far too long if ISRG is going to move into the smaller platform arena. Regulatory approval red tape should be dealt with proactively too.
Thank god they have Ximedica because otherwise I think our chances would be zero.
The first question on the survey would have to be: "Have you ever heard about SPORT?" (and Surgibot)
Most ISRG surgeons and medical technology stakeholders probably don't know beans about SPORT. That's been attested to no end by the unbelievably crappy pps behavior. Titan's off-the-radar!! Always!!
If anything, the survey should provide a little education to the market. Surprising move on the part of ISRG, IMO. Free advertising for Titan (and Transenterix)
However, ISRG will move even faster into smaller platforms if the survey results support SPORT.
Patents held by Titan don't cover mobility and overall size.
TITAN BETTER PICK UP THE SPEED or ISRG will beat them at their own game, snakearms notwithstanding!!
Man I feel smart. I just posted today that ISRG has to be R&D'ing smaller SPORT-like platforms.
I did not know until the survey until now.
Unless something major from another company blindsides us. Anyone have any thoughts or info on who that could be?
ISRG must be seeing the sense of producing a smaller, cheaper, mobile system too. I will be surprised if they don't announce one within a year. They will not be designing something bigger than daVinci in Intuitive's R&D department, for sure. Going SPORT-size is where they will go next. Mark my words.
My gut feeling is that SPORT was not ready for prime time as the original timeline ticked down, even with only the chole indication. That fed into their decision to add the other indications at the expense of time. I can wait for a stronger product. So far, there is no concrete negative I know of that Titan is up against, no "bad news", only the risk that someone is going to enter the field before them.
I've searched around and can find no real contenders, but that is not saying that a company with the brains and bucks isn't ready to beat us to the punch. Samsung, Olympus,..., etc. are companies that could do this.
30 engineers @ $100,000 average compensation is $250,000/month
You need a major investment-oriented article, or coverage by an investment analyst, to move this thing out of the dumps.
And what would would they say: Things look good but it's a 2 year play. Nothing will happen fast, and it's a good bet someone else could come out of the woodwork.
I don't expect ths pps to do anything short of major company announcement.
Thank you, gentlemen, for telling me where you heard about the meeting.
I also missed where that information about a NYC meeting came from. Could someone fill me in?
Time is working against Hargrove too. THe SPORT technology is there with or without him. It's not his invention, not his medical expertise.
As we all know now, he once "retired" alreasdy, and wants his daughter to succeed big too.
He has a lot of experience to provide at the helm of Titan but if the opportunity to step up the game with a suitable MA comes along, I suspect he'll go for it. That's not a failure.
Then the question becomes why the excitement about the synchronized bed for daVinci? Someone must see the utility, otherwise an expensive item like that will be DOA. Not questioning your observation at all, just making me wonder why someone cared to develop it in the first place. Different practices in Europe?
I wouldn't blink an eye cashing in on $5.
My impression was that it can simultaneously reposition or adjust the patient as the daVinci arms all get readjusted. Not sure if the bed controls DaVinci or vice-versa, or both.
For example, the patient could be tilted for some specific procedure or hemodynamic issue, intraoperatively, and the bed or DaVinci just moves along perfectly. No danger to the patient by moving them first, or the robot first, or trying to coordinate the two. There must be limits of travel too, that are designed in. SPORT may not have those limits of travel in the first place.
I think it is ultimately a VERY IMPORTANT FEATURE that daVinci users will find useful in select situations. If ISRG had been a bit more visionary this may have been part of the daVinci design from the beginning.
SPORT would need to be designed specifically to work with this bed, and vice-versa. The fact that SPORT is mobile and doesn't have a fixed reference to the bed and floor means that some other way of registering the SPORT position and the bed position would need to be developed. Then they would need to talk to one another; then SPORT would need to be able to actuate itself to move appropriately. Don't think anything like that is around the corner at this time for SPORT. Titan should make it a point to understand this technology completely as it could be related to their designs in the future.
Nice. Leave it to the Germans. If someone tried to design this in the US the FDA would have said unsafe, someone could roll off.
After looking back over some SPORT photos, it may be that the unarticulated section of the SPORT snake protruding out of the barrel is where extension retraction of the effector (while under control) can take place. I think that the available length of forward/backward motion along the barrel axis may match the length of that section.
I hope that is how it works.
I agree with your observation, although the SPORT arms must also have a maximum entension length. And, once a chosen SPORT effector is advanced into the field, I don't know in fact if it can be retracted while still being actively controlled. I don't think any of the SPORT videos have shown any retraction or extension motion. It certainly would be nice to see but my sneaking suspicion is that SPORT is still not far enough along in design that range of motion development is complete.
My guess is that based on its apparent design, a SPORT effector is advanced to its design length, locked into the controlling mechanism in the robotic control "head" and then the surgeon is left with a fixed length snake. Motion forward and backward along the axis of the barrel is done by extending or tightening the triangulation.
I wish I knew for sure. Titan is unlikely to explain that level of detail for some time.
Also note on Surgibot video that Up/Down and Left/Right movements of the effectors are opposite natural motion of the surgeon's hands.
Not so with actuator-based, non-mechanically linked systems (fly-by-wire) like SPORT.
I think this is a CRITICAL feature difference.
Somehow impressive and awkward looking at the same time; it's an odd impression that I get as an engineer. The "sunglasses" unfortunately make it look like a Saturday Night Live skit. I assume they need to be removed to see normally about the room.
1) I fail to see that the claim the "surgeon is closer to the patient" has any relevance here. The Surgibot instrument system is a barrier in the same way that sitting at a SPORT remote console a few feet away is a barrier. It's not like the Surgibot surgeon is just going to drop the handles, reach down, make a cut with a scalpel, and be up to their elbows dealing with a problem. No advantage over SPORT at all, as long as both surgeons are scrubbed in for the sterile field and ready to don fresh gloves.
2) I doubt very much that any significant natural force sensation can come across the frictions and linkages of interjoining mechanisms and stiffening of the "triangulation setting", so I doubt "haptic feedback" is really well-preserved from that available doing conventional lap surgery. It is certainly not improved.
My guess is that the Surgibot's claim "we have natural haptic feedback" will not withstand scrutiny. No fault of the design, just the nature of passive mechanical interfaces.
3) The REAL advantage of a Surgibot-type design would be that the surgeon COULD relax their stance or body or arm or head position, but that seems impossible in this video. Honestly, and I'm not joking, the surgeon would be better served by having a very high chair to allow his hands to be at lap level, LEVEL forearms, elbow rests, something to lean forward against, and a monitor in from of his eyes. What I've just described is a REMOTE CONSOLE, like SPORT.
2014 Surgical text mentions Titan. Atlas of Single-Port, Laparoscopy, and Robotic Surgery: A Practical Approach in Gynecology ... (link below, but only a google books preview)
edited by Pedro F. Escobar
Page 318, Chapter on Single Site Robotics. After a discussion of daVinci as being the only system available, Titan is mentioned as another platform (one sentence).
The Table of Contents is interesting both as a list of indications, and Authors. Advincula is in there.
It would appear that Titan could only conclude that a platform competing with ISRG could not make a sure launch with only chole. HOWEVER, they also cannot wait until they have all the bases covered. Their SAB will never be satisfied. They still need to run with a game plan similar to their original plan. In that case, I am hoping they push a version of SPORT to the market in less time than 2 years, and add tools for other indications as they are created. At a minimum, the market must see that they are actively developing more indications, even as they consider purchase.
http://books.google.com/books?id=6mseBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA318&lpg=PA318&dq=canadian+robotic+surgery+company&source=bl&ots=AcO3lu5hr6&sig=1iKfaL0Bep4qTY3w3KKSaHUB1K8&hl=en&sa=X&ei=-3KDVPrbE42RyATWsIEI&ved=0CFcQ6AEwBTgK#v=onepage&q=canadian%20robotic%20surgery%20company&f=false
Satisfying trading for the day, given the recent reset.
Hey, there are times in life where anyone could sell out their career for $10,000,000 . That's $200,000/yr for 50 years. That's $400,000/yr for 25 years. Let's assume you are 40 years old: $400K a year to live on, no headaches, free time, and invest for retirement. I could handle it.
Do what I just did. Printed out the pretty blue Milestones timeline from the Titan website and taped it to the wall over my desk.
Whenever I'm feeling a bit anxious about my shares I can just glance up and remind myself how far away each milestone is and that I can relax, everything is going just fine.
I don't know what Point's business is but possibly he is now engaged in some capacity by Titan, Bertner, etc..
He put out better press for SPORT than the Titan gang, that's for sure.
My name is Bristol19 and I'm a Titanholic. Read this board at least 5x a day.
If we can rise claw our way up about 50 cents I'll be sorely tempted to sell at break-even and buy myself a few nice toys and pay off the kid's school loans. That's better than for me than two more years of anxiety.
The new timeline appears WAY too long given where we THOUGHT they were before the revision.
50 cents!!!!
Thanks for that information. That's heartening.
Let's liven up this joint! Who here thinks this is the next Apple? Anyone see $400/sh just like ISRG?
Only reason the video clip is on their website is because Duke saw it at the show where he met JH and PH. Couldn't deny it so they threw us a bone. According to Duke, JH was showing the video because he didn't have anything else and didn't even want to attend.
I've been snooping around for nuggets like Honey, but haven't been coming up with anything. Perhaps Ximedica is the best potential source of any leaks.
Perhaps we should just all go quiet too, but sitting in the red with nothing to go on sucks.
My observation is that the technical analysis calls here have gotten our interest and appeared accurate. Why? Because what drives this stock price is mostly not speculative investor interest, and certainly not enthusiasm, and certainly not rumor or leaked information. Why? It is still off the radar.
The technical analysis doesn't factor in sentiment or excitement or rumor or unexpected news, just dry periodic shifts and stock market factors that can't even be quantified, maybe not even be defined. It's working because there is no excitement out there. And now word on our very, very, very small street is 'oh, nothing happening for two years', and 'ISRG has got single port already'.
I'd much rather have Titan Medical more in the public eye, especially now that we're talking two years until anything substantial happening.
Yes, single port is not a marketing tool any longer when it comes to comparing with DaVinci SP. Titan should be focusing on developing the economic reasons for choosing SPORT and let any advantages surgically prove themselves organically.
1) D-
2) D-
3) unknown now
Now that I'm thinking SPORT will have to compete with with ISRG Sp only on economics and efficiency, rather than surgical innovation, I'm starting to rethink this whole delay strategy.
While more indications are better overall, perhaps a foothold earlier with one indication would have been a better approach (bet). Low sales, but at least you are in the market and learning something, developing a sales force, a training system, getting feedback, etc..
The SAB and supposedly other hospital-capital-movers put in their input; Titan listened. But maybe common sense would say put a product out there that's solid and you stand a fair chance of success over the long run.
OK, so now we've shed the low risk of a dud launch but are delaying such that the competition can adapt to anything we do, or simply out-innovate. We also risk other parties moving in.
In order to pull off this new strategy Titan will REQUIRE a BIG WAR CHEST. Having just enough $$ to get to launch IS NOT ENOUGH.
THEY MUST RAISE SIGNIFICANTLY LARGE SUMS of $$ for buffering setbacks, accelerated marketing, training, accelerated R&D, engineering, manufacturing etc..
They need to do it now. How to do that when you are a 1 buck stock on a small exchange, limited visibility, and a ISRG behemoth in the next room? Concurrent with the development strategy, they need to be raising more money immediately - not just burning. To say they have enough to get to the finish line is a joke. There is no finish line.
This is the new reality.
Well they were planning/hoping/working for a 2015 release. I also make the mental mistake of imagining a SPORT that was sitting there just about ready to seek CE approval, and now delayed for "additions". I don't think it was anywhere near the design freeze that we all were expecting imminently. So, they are moving along with all the features they envision now for multiple indications, and still the basics to boot.
I really think the third arm of Xi will be a feature that will haunt Titan when it comes time to compete, even if the surgical truth about it as expressed by this board's surgeons is that it is superfluous, badly positioned, difficult to control, or of limited effectiveness. Otherwise, if multiple incisions are going to be needed for retraction, stapling, etc., anyway, the "single-port" innovation that SPORT trumpets is far from an honest advantage (and selling point). I really, really hope Titan has some surprises to spring on us and the market because they are going to need them. ISRG has the resources to do what is needed to maintain competition until something truly radical comes along. SPORT is not that radical; its advantage will need to be sold on size, cost, and efficiency. I really thing this will be a war of economic marketing, not surgical effectiveness.
This thing is either going to be the bomb right off the starting line, or the dud of the year.
I second your opinion that ISRG is not to be underestimated, ridiculed, or derided for technology, or even their business model. They continue to spearhead surgical robotics and have the money and resources to adapt as needs be. Titan will have to have a very good game to compete in the niches they can. The longer Titan takes, the lower their chances to succeed will be.
I've wondered about the same thing, translation of the finger/hand/wrist motions at the controller into snake motion. Could be a difficult learning curve, maybe very easy. Undoubtedly complicated electromechanically in either case. That's another reason why I think haptics are still far in the future for SPORT. Hope I'm wrong.
My wife and I cracked up when we saw that Surgibot link. But really, is it classified as a disposable; it's only 5 bucks?! SPORT is going to be a lot more expensive! That doesn't bode well for Titan; HARGROVE,YOU MUST REDUCE THE PRICE OF SPORT!
Any opinion on the hook-shaped bovie? Not sure what the point of that shape is except to provide double duty as a "mini retractor" of sorts. Are curved bovies found in regular surgery instrumentation?
It would appear to me that the curved shape, for cutting, may be less precise than a straight tip, especially if some part of the curve touches tissue unintentionally.
Italian product may obtain marketing and sales advantages in the EU. Not to mention EU subsidies.
Titan is in a multi-player race now whether they know it or not.
Upward (or any angle)view might be attainable if the entire SPORT unit (barrel and external hardware)can be rotated around the long axis. That would probably be something that needs to be built into the armature supporting the SPORT unit itself. Hope this wasn't a design oversight. Otherwise you'll have to suspend the patient from the ceiling and work from underneath like a mechanic and a car lift!
They will want extra money on hand for unexpected circumstances, extra or accelerated engineering or programming work, legal issues, marketing, training, etc.. More money will be better, hence the need to get the pps up eventually.