Dive Brief:
- Intuitive Surgical said Tuesday it is buying businesses that distribute its da Vinci and Ion surgical robots to establish a direct presence in Italy, Spain, Portugal, Malta and San Marino.
- Ab Medica, Abex, Excelencia Robotica and their affiliates currently handle distribution in those countries. Intuitive is acquiring the parts of those companies that manage its surgical robots.
- The deal, which is expected to close in 2026, will allow Intuitive to integrate the businesses into its existing European operations. Intuitive said the deal will help it better understand customer needs.
Dive Insight:
Intuitive already provides its products through direct sales organizations in most European countries. The exceptions are Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece and Eastern European countries. The pending deals, which are subject to approvals and closing conditions, will put an existing Intuitive operation that handles sales in key European markets such as Germany in charge of distribution in more countries.
Dirk Barten, who leads the commercial and marketing organization that will handle distribution in the additional markets, said in a statement that direct access to customers is “critical for building greater patient access to minimally invasive care.” Intuitive CEO Gary Guthart added that direct access will help deepen the company’s “understanding of unique customer needs in these countries.”
The deal comes as Intuitive prepares to expand sales of its latest surgical robot, da Vinci 5, to Europe and grapples with challenges that are constraining growth in the region. Talking at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference in January, Guthart said the company is working on launching da Vinci 5 in Europe and has prioritized making sure it “can supply globally, not just in the U.S.”
Da Vinci 5 will launch into a European capital market that Guthart characterized as “stressed.” The causes of the stress vary by country, the CEO said, with “government policies around deployment of capital” creating problems in the U.K. and “a change in the healthcare system” challenging Intuitive in Germany. While the capital market is stressed, Intuitive is seeing procedure growth in countries including Italy.
The European capital market is one of the factors that will influence growth at Intuitive this year. At the low end of its sales guidance, Intuitive is assuming the capital market challenges in Europe continue and constrain “the incremental capacity that they can put in place to support procedure growth,” CFO Jamie Samath said at the J.P. Morgan event. The high end of the range assumes the environment normalizes.
