Interview with CEO Don Robbins (CTUM) 16 Jan 2008. (Mr. Robbins' replies to interviewer.)
Focus of company
DR: “Currently, our entire focus is bringing our LT welding technology to the market. It bonds together human tissue without the use of sutures, glues, staples or sealants.”
Trends in the market
DR: “The trend in market right now is sutures and staples which leave foreign matter in the body. Using our technology we’re able to reconnect hollow organs without the use of sutures or staples. It’s almost bloodless. It’s quite fast, and it has the effect, according to the doctors in the Ukraine who have done thousands of human surgeries, it has the effect of the patient healing for two to three days … the patient recovers faster, there’s less time spent in the surgery room.”
Competitive Edge
DR: “What gives our company the competitive edge is the fact we’ve done thousands of human surgeries in Ukraine. So rather than something that’s being taken to market that someone believes might work, we know that it works. That’s part of the advantage that we have. Part of another advantage we have is that we’re able to do our surgeries rather quickly and rather efficiently.”
Key Executives
DR: “Frank D’Amelio who is 26 years in the medical device industry and (has had) a stellar career. He has been working with us as a consultant since November 2006…joined us today (Jan 16, 2007) as president of Live Tissue Connect. Frank has led the project. From 2006 he has orchestrated the development of both the instruments and the electro-surgery generator. (As to) the electro-surgery generator, we received approval of the CE mark to enter the European (and UK) markets with the generator about a month and a half ago. “
Milestones over next 12 to 18 months
DR: “We hope to enter the European market at the end of this quarter (Q1, 2008) or first part of next quarter. There are a lot of distributors that are speaking with us currently, as well as a number of major companies speaking with us, who have indicated an interest in at least one of the 13 divisions that we’ve set up under Live Tissue Connect (Inc). We hope to bring our end-to-end anastomosis for reconnecting intestines. We are about to finish the prototypes up. We’ve done a number of tests with the particular generator. And we hope to begin building the commercial unit in the U.S. in the next few months and filing for both CE mark and U.S. FDA (approval) sometime by the end of this year on that particular product. “
Closing comments
DR: “We’ve just touched the tip of the iceberg here on what this technology is capable of doing. We’ve watched the Ukrainians do lung resections, go across the lung, leak-proof, which is very much like suturing or stapling a sponge. They’re able to complete that bit of surgery, once they get down to the lung, in less than 30 seconds.
Additionally, they are able to repair ruptured spleens rather than having them removed. A spleen…. it’s just like trying to suture or staple Jell-O.… To our knowledge… we’re not aware of companies that can do that.“
Final comment www.ctum.com
DR: “Go to the international website. You can find a lot of information on the company. The other website, the US domestic website, has very little on it. And until we finish with the FDA, we will not be putting anything on that site.”
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