Where I fit

Three kinds of company, and what I would do first in each.

The same thing gets a product stuck at every company I have worked in: engineering built something that works, the sales force cannot yet say what it is worth in the buyer's words, and the hospital has not been given a reason to approve it. I translate one product into those three languages. Here is what that looks like in the three situations I know best. Deeper profiles for each are available on request.

Pre commercial through first launch

A robotic system launching with its digital layer

The situationClearance is in hand or the submission is in. There are a handful of first sites. The digital layer has to ship with the robot, and the company has never priced software, contracted for data, or trained a sales force to sell it.
What I would do firstDecide what the robot owns and what the layer owns, and write it down. Package the layer with the system and price the bundle. Write the contracting that lets capital sales attach the software. Stand up the first sites so the evidence starts on day one. Train the sales force to sell something they have not sold before.
Why meI have done this on a surgical robot, from the first interoperability function to the first digital platform to the evidence for the first subscription. I have launched a robotic system in a new market through a joint venture and through distributors. And I built CathIQ to show what the layer should look like before the first system ships.

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Growth stage, product in market

Surgical AI with no hardware

The situationThe software works and a few hospitals use it. Pilots are not turning into programs. The buyer is an IT committee as much as a surgeon, pricing is still per pilot, and the evidence is anecdotal.
What I would do firstPrice and package for the hospital buyer, with the subscription structure decided. Put adoption inside the clinician's workflow rather than beside it. Turn the first sites into real world evidence. Build a sales motion a partner or a small direct team can carry, and give it the words.
Why meI commercialized a digital platform sold to hospitals on top of somebody else's capital, then moved a stranded telepresence application onto that platform and opened it to every customer, so clinicians scheduled it themselves, and commissioned the evidence that made it part of a subscription. I have sold to the hospital IT committee since my first job.

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Established company, new line

An established company adding a digital line to an installed base

The situationA strategic's platform unit, or an OR infrastructure, imaging, or integration company entering the connected OR, including family owned and foreign headquartered companies with a US subsidiary. The company has customers, a capital sales force, and a new line that the sales force does not yet know how to sell.
What I would do firstMake the new line one offering with what the company already sells. Price it through the council and get it onto every quote. Build the demo that feels like a real room and script it. Line up the partners and the integrations the category needs. Train the capital sales force to sell the new thing alongside the old.
Why meAt Olympus I did exactly this, combining three companies' products into one connected OR offering and enabling a sales force that had never sold OR infrastructure. At Intuitive I founded the function that connected da Vinci to the operating room around it, then commercialized the platform that followed inside a capital business.

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If your company is one of these, I would like to talk.

Tell me which one, and where it is stuck.

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