Toshiba America Medical Systems has sharply focused its U.S. ultrasound product efforts. The vendor has ended the sales of scanners into such markets as ob/gyn and urology--which were channeled through dealers--in order to focus its own direct sales efforts on radiology and cardiology, according to Daniel Dugan, vice president for ultrasound business operations.
"We cover the (U.S.) market with dedicated ultrasound people and no distributors," Dugan told SCAN.
Trimming its product line will help TAMS avoid customer confusion about what scanners are meant for which markets. The strategy will also let the vendor concentrate ultrasound advertising, marketing and sales resources on the two dominant user groups in this market, he said.
"We may come back to the ob/gyn market, for instance, but with a product designed and built for the U.S. market and a dedicated organization set up to sell it," Dugan said.
TAMS has expanded its ultrasound sales and service staff to focus on these two large market segments. Although some short-term revenue was sacrificed by the shift of products, overall ultrasound revenue will have grown 45% to 50% in fiscal 1991 (end-March). This makes TAMS the fastest growing ultrasound company in the U.S., he said.
Toshiba is readying the seventh software revision for its 270 high-end ultrasound scanner, which should be available by May. A unique feature of the upgrade is independent beam steering for gray-scale imaging, spectral Doppler and color-flow Doppler, said Thomas Jedrzejewicz, director of marketing.
Gray-scale imaging is optimized when the beam runs perpendicular to the vessel. However, vessels do not always run parallel to the skin, he noted. Color-flow Doppler, on the other hand, requires its own approach to the vessel for optimization of the flow velocity map.
