Titan Medical Inc (TMDIF)

[Daktari]

Let me tell you a story:

Many years ago GI surgery was done with only hand-sewing to make an anastomosis (connection between 2 segments of intestines). This usually took a long time and there was concern about increased leaks of the anastomosis that lead to increased mortality & morbidity. The hand-sewn connection was only as good as the surgeon's skill and patience. In Russia, someone developed a stapler that could mechanically create an anastomosis. Their was this American guy who was visiting Russia and brought back a sample of this stapler. He met this other guy in the states and together they decided to start a company called US Surgical. They modified the surgical stapler and took 100% of the market-share. It took time for surgeons to except the surgical stapler but. Meanwhile at J&J, a decision was made to try to take part of that market share by selling their own surgical stapler. They hired a guy called John Hargrove for the task. He figured out a way to enable Ethicon to take up 65% of the marked-share in 2 years. US Surgical no longer exists and when you think of surgical staplers today, you think of Ethicon!