The Art of “Seeing” – Chapter 2

By Tamer Flores, CEO and Strategy Specialist

Have you ever “SEEN” the opportunity to get ahead in your market with enough time to build a campaign and really take advantage of it?

With the right Technical & Commercial knowledge you just might have the chance to do that, and this is one time when I seized such opportunity.

THE CASE OF THE “PREDICTION OF FUTURE MEDICAL DEVICE FAILURES”:

When I was working as CEO of a company distributing Pacemakers and Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillators (ICDs) internationally, one day the VP of International Sales from my partner company -the manufacturer- called me to ask for my opinion on the following issue:

Some pacemakers from a competitor were failing by switching from a programable rate of 60 beats per minute (bpm) to 100 bpm without any external intervention or programming.

I always put a big effort in knowing as much as possible of the technical part of our products’ and the competitors’, and that’s why my partner called me even if I was not a direct employee from their company. They respected my opinion because of my deep knowledge of internal components and field applications of the devices. I knew that this type of failure was due to a component called “magnetic switch” or “reed switch” that was getting stuck in an “ON” position making the pacemakers go from whatever it’s programmed frequency was to a fixed frequency of 100 bpm.

I told the VP: “This is not good for them but in 6 months it’s going to get a lot worse”. “Why” the VP asked, and I proceeded to explain him the technical, marketing and business reasons why this had the potential to become a very big problem for our competitor’s products, company, brand, and even stock price:

1st: TECHNICAL REASONS

1.     For the pacemakers to go from 60 bpm to exactly 100 bpm, that means that a component called magnetic switch (reed switch) is failing, it’s getting stuck in the ON position.

2.     The same component is used in ICDs (Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillators). However, in ICDs the device response when the reed switch gets stuck is different: it will INHIBIT THERAPY, which means that the device WILL NOT shock a patient when is needed.

3.     This will create a much worse outcome for this company’s devices in its Cardiac Rhythm Management (CRM) division.

2nd: MARKETING REASONS

 4.     I said: “I believe that if they DON’T SEE this issue and fix it before it happens, it will start showing in about 6 months from the pacemakers’ initial failures”. This will be a marketing disaster for them.

5.     We decided together to start a GLOBAL marketing campaign saying that our ICDs were the most reliable ones in the world, since we had the only ICD brand that had never had a recall in the whole history of these devices.

3rd: BUSINESS REASONS

6.     The competitor’s main marketing message had always been that their BRAND was the most technologically advanced one of them all. If this happens, they will have to re-brand and re-market themselves starting both processes all over again.

7.     The way this advanced medical device market works, a catastrophic failure will significantly reduce the stock price of such company, and it will take years to recover as it has happened before.

So, due to my technical knowledge and predictions my partner started the planned GLOBAL marketing campaign, and 6 months after that, exactly as I predicted the competitor’s ICDs showed failures because they hadn’t recalled those units on time. They DIDN’T SEE the issue before it showed up in the field and didn’t take the appropriate corrective action. Therefore, their pacemakers and their ICDs both lost their customer’s trust, and they also lost their main marketing and branding that they had been working on for years. Their stock price plummeted to almost half of what it was before the issue, and it took several years for it to recover.

My partner company though made several hundred million dollars by taking over sales of these devices all over the world thanks to my prediction. My company also took advantage of it in our territories.

This is an example in the strategy, commercial and business development side of business that happens every day. These kinds of circumstances are many times right in front of your eyes but you may ignore them if you are not alert. This is why it is important to have that extra instinct and talent, so that you can work to develop The Art of “Seeing”.

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