White Box Ortho

What's going on with this???

 

Several long time Wright's distributors developed a business that completely cuts out the rep for pods and surgery centers. Wright medical supplies the implant to whitebox to package. The Wright managers are being told to use this to after pods and surgery centers. This will screw the reps. So wright gets to sell their joints under the Wright name main stream then uses the whitebox company to sell against stelkast and all the other little companies looking for pods.

 

They are also doing the same thing with bone graft. They have started repackaging bone graft under a different brand name and targeting spine distributors. The funny thing is that both the whitebox and bone graft use wright medical surgical techniques and show the companies being located at Wright. Instead of spending the money to develop the total joint line they do shady things like this. Do the reps, shareholders, design surgeons know this is going on?

 

Proof/Links/etc. - please provide

 

This is the whitebox website. You have an advance knee. You also have a dynasty shell with a profemur Z classic stem. You can go look at the surgical techs on Wrights website to compare to these surgical techniques.
http://www.whiteboxortho.com/products.asp

This is Edge Spine website. The products are repackaged CellPlex and Allomatrix. You can look at the brochures on Wrights website to compare to these.
http://www.edge-spine.com/

 

Any more information on this. I am considering a position with Wright but this is making me question whether they are on the up and up.

 

PODS? Phys Owned Dist?? ---- What exactly does Wright hope to gain from this? Still need reps to get product to hosp - check trays/implants - set up scrub techs - restock - bill etc. (Everything a Surgical Rep does now) ----- We know the surgeons themselves won't be doing this - they will need someone on the front line -- How will pricing compare? And do the 'Old' Wright Med distributors make a commision on each sale? Many hospitals, as far as joints are concerned require a rep in the room - and most surgery centers are ambulatory centers which are not equipped for primary procedures - please inform - thx in advance

 

I really don't know how this makes sense for Wright. The major concern I have is the ethical issues. Do the stockholders, employees, design consultants know this. Do the design surgeons who designed the Wright implants Whitebox is using recieve royalties off the whitebox implants. Do the shareholders know that whitebox is benefitting of the Research and development, manufacturing cost, product management, surgeon insight, etc involved in bring the Wright Products to market that Whitebox is using.

yes, i believe the "old distributors" do get some cut off whitebox sales. I don't know all the details on how they are implementing this into PODs but they have some form of reorder system that when the facility opens the implants a chip signals an automatic restock.

 

Seems 'Whitebox' will only be made available to those hospitals that will be flying solo - 'No Rep Needed/Required' - which is going to be a rarity in itself - It is also geared more for territories that require 3+hrs drive between hospitals -- In more rural area of the U.S -- Also, will most likely not be made available to PODs b/c why hire PODs when the hospital is running the show - So as it stands, not much to worry about

 

The last answer didn't really address a lot of the issues, ones related to whether the shareholders etc need to be informed, how much did whitebox benefit from all the investments of wright.

Also, if wright did this in your territory would that give you a way out of your noncompete. It seems that I Wright is using backdoor methods to potentially compete with its own reps that may give you enough to get out of your noncompete.

 

I hope everyone knows that home office is opportunistic and that if there is an opportunity to make money they will and could care less if any rep or distributor gets hurts. The more that can be sold without paying royalties or commissions the better. As for shareholders and the BOD--whitebox is a good investment if it can make a profit. Corporate will not care about designers--just more cost to cut out anyway. I heard that everything is going to be harder for us and that this business will become more like pharma everyday--brand vs. generic canabilism, more compliance, more big brother, les pay. It is all about streamlining, but that is what every ortho company is becoming--sales people just need to be robots and get the commission. Simple stupid selling to your base and don't worry about whitebox until you actually lose a customer.

 

Here is the reality of the situation.

The surgeons that Wright is targeting with this product line are guys that are looking to make a ton of money at their surgery centers. Chances are these guys have done hundreds of hip and knee replacements. Do they really need a rep? Answer that honestly.

I donb't think that a lot of these surgeons feel that they do. All they need is somebody at the surgery center that is dedicated to inventory and re-stocking the sets and implants. That's not hard to do.

This type of situation is becoming more regular in the US.

 

If that was the only reason then why not do it under the Wright name? Why the need to start a front of a company whitebox? Also, surgeons don't randomly use wright medical products. I haven't heard of a surgeon who would uses Wright joints regarless of the rep unless they are on contract. So this whole idea to cut reps out of the picture needs the reps to get the surgeon on board. Unless the reps are going to be compensated then once they get wind of this then good luck having reps set up opportunities for people who support this to get in front of their surgeon. Also if this does happen to a rep you can almost guarantee he will go to a competitor.

 

Why don't they do it under the Wright Medical name? Simple. Once some of Wright's bigger accounts find out that they are offering Wright Medical Products at 50% lower prices than what they are paying they will be furious. Wright will then have to honor the lower pricing in order to stop from losing all of the business.

 

anyone know why Wright locked out the edge spine website? how do I get a hold of these products?

 

it will never be made available to PODS or POCS. They have been fairly clear on this point

 

There is no intent to try and hide the fact that Whitebox implants and WMT implants are the same items. The idea is to make this very obvious so that hospitals/surgeons using Whitebox understand the clinical history and quality systems behind the product. Companies like StelKast can't provide this comfort level with their implants. Also, all royalties will be paid for the Whitebox implants under the same terms as the WMT implants due to the terms of the consutling agreement. Also, WMT knows that pricing consultants will quickly identify that WMT and Whitebox implants are the same. Selling under a seperate legal entity offers two advantages: 1) It clearly lays out that if you want this low price then you will get no rep coverage, and 2) distribution agreements prevent WMT from selling within designated territories. However, there is nothing stopping Whitebox from selling into these same areas. Whitebox can sell directly to surgery centers and surgeon owned hospitals without having to pay commisions. This would not be possible under the WMT name due to the distribution agreements. WMT can cut 20% off their pricing without a negative impact to margins. However, they can also piss off the sales force.

 

So you take an implant and put it in a new box. You tell the docs its the exact same implant but you can give it to him for really cheap. You then tell the rep and the other hospitals in the area that this is a completely different entity so you don't have to pay a rep commision and can charge more at all the other hospitals. Not that Wright has a market share or is a real competitor but if I see this non sense in my territory I will be sure to let all the hospitals that are paying a premium to get thier implants in a Wright Medical box know that Wright is selling them for half that price to hospital x because they are in a different box.

 

You can tell the hospital anything you would like to tell them on pricing. You sound like a bunch of spoiled children actually. Yes, this should piss everyone off. All of us that have blood and sweat in this very developed and mature industry are seeing our world change in some not so subtle ways, and these jerks are going to accelerate and accentuate it.

The Whitebox model is not the Wright model period. For those hospitals/surgery centers who are willing to take chances and use a "private label" joint without a sales rep, telling a hospital they can get the Wright brand for the same price, but with loaned instruments, a sales rep(s), loaner implants, and all of the ancillary and adjunct services that go with our type of products and service will only make you look even more like a dip shit that does not understand what group of customers these guys are going after. I am begging you not to say this as it will also initiate a question like the following.

"If a little company like Wright can sell a knee for 2k, then why can Zimmer not sell the joint without a rep for 2k. We will just ask Zimmer to sell it for 2K, but remove the rep".

A news flash for those that don't spreken ze deutsch, car companies do this type echelon marketing all the time. Stop being a baby and harden up. This is about to get very rough, and we do not need any brain trust to ask stupid fucking questions about why Wright won't drop it's prices on their brand name product. Pray someone acquires these guys, but stop letting all of your ignorance out at one time.

 

This person has nailed it. I am sorry to say that, but he is correct from my perspective and the larger markets (Philly and NJ) are going to get it faster than others unfortunately.