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The Medical Device Tax? No Big Deal.

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"There is a lot of price pressure in the medical device sector, acknowledged Pivot Medical's Julian Nikolchev at the Bay Area Biomedical Device Conference. 'But we have more than enough leeway.'"

Medical Device +Diagnostics Industry, Brian Buntz

At yesterday's Bay Area Biomedical Device Conference held at San Jose State University, an audience member asked a panel of three medtech executives how harmful the medical device tax would be to their business. The 2.3% tax is scheduled to go into effect next year.

There is a lot of price pressure in the medical device sector, acknowledged Julian Nikolchev, founder of Pivot Medical. "But we have more than enough leeway. So, of all the things I worry about, I am not that worried about the [medical device tax]. Nikolchev went on to say that, of course, he rather not spend money on the tax but called it "utterly irrelevant." Pivot Medical would continue to have enough to spend on R&D, clinical trial work, and so forth, he said.

Adam Elsesser, CEO of Penumbra agreed with Nikolchev's assessment. "There are a lot of things that are going on in the industry that are putting pressure on the medical device [companies]. [The device tax] is only one aspect to it," he said. "I would rather see more-rationalized decision making at the FDA level than worry about the tax." Elsesser said that he did not think that venture investors were making decisions based on the device tax, adding that it is "really not a concern". . .View Full Article

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