Volcano: Learning To Thrive In A Declining PCI Market

Article preview from IN VIVO - March, 2013

Long used to a growing market driven by favorable demographics, cardiovascular companies are facing a declining PCI market, in the US and Europe at least, and are forced to shift their strategies to adapt. Volcano, for one, is articulating a new way to approach this declining market.

Volcano: Learning To Thrive In A Declining PCI Market

Article preview from IN VIVO - March, 2013

For years, the medical device industry could, for the most part, count on increasing procedure volumes to act as a rising tide that lifts all boats; that is, whatever more immediate countervailing pressures, strong demographics, pent up demand, and new technology opened a seemingly endless number of new doors. In interventional cardiology in particular, in-roads made on traditional surgical revascularization and other procedures made percutaneous coronary interventions (PCIs) a growth industry for much of the 1990s and 2000s.

The introduction in interventional cardiology recently of novel technologies to enable procedures such as transcather valve replacement (TAVR) and renal denervation are only the latest examples of the ever expanding world of interventional cardiology, introducing especially in the case of TAVR an alternative to surgery that just a decade ago would have seemed impossible. But the explosive promises of both transcatheter valves and renal denervation have taken on a greater import recently because they come not against a background of a growing PCI market, but rather because they stand in relief to a PCI market that at least in the major geographies, the US, Europe, and Japan, is in decline.

For those companies that are developing new technology in renal denervation or TAVR, the markets should continue to grow nicely for the next several years. So, too, companies positioning themselves for emerging markets such as China and India, will see those markets grow as well. But for all others in interventional cardiology, particularly those companies that have historically based their sales and marketing strategies on the US and Europe, market prospects are, if not grim, at least sobering. No longer can they count on organic growth and strong pricing levels, at least in stable coronary percutaneous interventions. Cardiovascular companies generally speaking are going to have to adapt to new market dynamics, many of them having little to do with clinical outcomes, and will need to learn a new vocabulary for expressing value and benefits.

Continued...

Purchase this article online as a PDF and receive it immediately via email. Questions? Call (800) 332-2181. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed.

Plus:
To find out about more about more about Elsevier Business Intelligence's medical device publications and databases, multi-user access and/or advertising with Medical Devices Today, please contact Kristy Kennedy at (480) 985-9512