Mazor Robotics posts first earnings since Medtronic deal

Medtronic’s ($MDT) robotic surgery partner Mazor Robotics ($MZOR) reported earnings Tuesday, the first time it has done so since tying up with the device giant earlier this year.

In May, the duo made two agreements involving co-promotion, co-development and commercial distribution worth up to $50 million to come in three potential tranches. In mid-July, Mazor met its first milestone--the launch of its Mazor X guidance platform for spinal surgeries--and stood to collect up to $20 million in a second tranche. This was on top of the $11.9 million it picked up when it inked the deals.

For the quarter ended June 30, Mazor posted $8.3 million in revenues, up 30% from $6.4 million the previous quarter and up 6% from $7.8 million one year prior. Meanwhile, the net loss for the quarter stood at $4.1 million, compared to $5.1 million the previous quarter and $2.1 million a year prior. And the company used $600,000 in cash for operating activities, while cash, cash equivalents and investments tallied up to $47.5 million, including the $11.9 million from Medtronic.

CEO Ori Hadomi expects to take the first year of its deal with Medtronic to “synchronize” the duo, anticipating “significant growth” in the second year and second stage of the agreements. Mazor has bolstered its sales team considerably, with the addition of hundreds of Medtronic reps. The combined sales force will focus on increasing awareness and interest in the Mazor X platform among surgeons in the U.S.

On the earnings call, Hadomi reiterated that the partnership with Medtronic is focused only on using Mazor X for spinal surgeries, but said that it may be expanded in the future to include collaboration on brain procedures.

In July, Mazor unveiled two new studies for its Renaissance robotic spinal surgery system. The first study showed that freehand minimally invasive surgery and freehand open surgery had three times the rate of complications than procedures conducted using Renaissance. Freehand surgeries also had 3.8 times the rate of surgery revision than surgeries using Renaissance. The second study indicated that using Renaissance significantly reduced the complication and revision rates when compared to traditional freehand surgery.

- here's the earnings transcript

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