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frequent1

05/01/19 9:25 PM

#86992 RE: RockoTaco #86989

Well you have the multiport robot Versius from CMR surgical already in action in Europe. They're quickly ramping up for fda approval as they announced back in dec 2018 they're doing validation testing in Nicholson center. Are they a buyout target for verb/jnj.?
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elMoose

05/01/19 9:27 PM

#86993 RE: RockoTaco #86989

Do you have any references as to what operating system Auris is using ? Wouldn't they need new approvals with any new firmware under the hood? I don't think that they can just install a new firmware after FDA approval. If that was true, all of them can play the switcheroo.

I don't believe that it is using Verb and this article is implying that.

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Johnson & Johnson’s $3.4bn move for the robotic surgery specialist Auris Health could be bad news for its Verb Surgical joint venture.

It’s official: Johnson & Johnson has agreed to pay $3.4bn for the robotic surgery specialist Auris Health, a company with which it was linked in January. Not only has the deal come in well above the mooted $2bn price tag, it also looks like an admission that all is not rosy with J&J’s existing robotic surgery project, Verb Surgical.

J&J maintained today that it was “very committed” to Verb, a joint venture with Alphabet's Verily division. But recent developments, and now the Auris buy, appear to tell a different story.

In January reports surfaced that Verb’s chief executive, Scott Huennekens, had left the company. Then comments by J&J’s leader, Alex Gorsky, during the group’s fourth-quarter earnings call suggested that the Verb programme had progressed more slowly than hoped.

Mr Gorsky said investors should expect news on the group’s robotic offering “over the course of 2020 and beyond”, but did not give any precise approval or commercial timelines, Stifel analysts noted.

Any delay at Verb could make it harder for J&J to compete against the robotic surgery market leader, Intuitive Surgical.
https://www.evaluate.com/vantage/articles/news/deals/jjs-auris-buy-looks-verb-swerve