Roll, I'm guessing they build at least three, as many as 5 units for human trials. This is based on their previous relationships with three Centers of Excellence in the past, plus a backup system (which gets to be more important once entering trials and trying to maintain a schedule, especially when milestones are being driven by that schedule) and one more system for Medtronic to play with, to get accustomed to the technology, etc. That would make 5 total.
Medtronic's interest in our patent portfolio is (just my guess) most likely to be applied liberally to their Hugo, which would therefore merit near complete re-design (which was already a necessity due to it's burdensome and burgeoning floorspace requirements). And Enos was just about ready to go to trials last fall from a design standpoint, so we should clearly be way ahead of Hugo for trials and regulatory approvals. The other advantage to this strategy is that it takes large amount of pressure off Medtronic, who can begin robotic sales with single port much more quickly, start building a, actual robotics customer base (beyond spine), and provide teasers of bigger things (Hugo) to come. But not TOO much bigger, as it would be with current Hugo!
ShortsRClowns, with respect to the conference, I think this one will go as most have in the past for Titan. Expectations run high in advance of the conference. Those expectations aren't met because it really isn't the forum for those types of "deals" which seem to be expected. Come Monday, we take a hit on PPS because people built up their expectations for no valid or viable reason, and nothing comes of it because - why would anything come of it? A few dozen or couple hundred doctors learn a little more about what is in our product pipeline. Not earth-shattering at this juncture; they can't even go badger their hospital administrators to buy one because they aren't yet available.
Hell, if I ever WERE to try to short this stock, that is probably when I would do it, because a drop of 2 to 6 cents in PPS will most likely occur on Monday for just that reason. (For the record, I will not be trying to short the stock; I have never sold a share, never shorted ANY stock, and have no plans to.)
As for my prediction for Monday, I hope they somehow prove me wrong.
And I do find it extremely interesting that Medtronic's two presentations have no assigned presenter yet, at least not listed on the web site as of this morning. Whereas their first presentation in Plenary II is immediately after Mr. McNally, I could facetiously conjecture that he will just stay there for the Medtronic session as well!
Message in reply to:
While we are slow...Anyone care to guess what MDT.....
Could possibly say about HUGO on Saturday?
It's going to be interesting if both MDT+TMDI,tout filing for IDE soon,then mention human trials etc..all while they either are going to distant the time frame between SPORT/ENOS and HUGO?
Also,I think TMDI being ahead of MDT perhaps,build out let's say 3 finished ready for human trials outside the US and commence the surgery's at the same time. Or is it wiser for them to use one with hands on and stay focused only using that one?
Thanks Roll
