Orthofix's spinal implants sales are growing, with its M6-C cervical disc seeing significant growth in the second quarter of 2021 year-over-year.
CEO Jon Serbousek discussed the company's second quarter performance in an Aug. 6 earnings call, transcribed by Seeking Alpha.
Three notes:
1. M6-C sales increased 105 percent in the second quarter, compared to the same period in 2020.
"Our strategy within the next-generation M6-C disc continues to be focusing on training new physician users, working with current surgeons practices to broaden their adoption, introducing new physician users to the entire Orthofix Spine portfolio and strengthen our global M6 clinical evidence, including our recent initiation of the M6-C two-level IDE study," Mr. Serbousek said.
2. Revenue from new surgeons performing their first cases with the device in the U.S. continues performing well. More than 900 surgeons have been trained with the M6-C, and Mr. Serbousek expects to see more conversions in the future.
"M6 is truly the only artificial cervical disc out there that mimics the natural motion of the native disk," Mr. Serbousek said. "We're going to focus on that, and we're really going to drive that. That is actually one of the things that attracts these surgeons to us and also helps them consider switching off of a fusion procedure to a motion procedure."
3. Orthofix's spinal fixation business in the U.S. grew compared to 2020, but it is still slightly below 2019 sales.
"Overall, our surgeon base in the U.S. spine fixation has increased modestly versus 2019 despite still being impacted by COVID," Mr. Serbousek said. "During the second quarter, although sequentially improving, we continue to experience a negative impact on complex multilevel procedures due to COVID factors."