MedTech Jam Session with Chris and Mike D

What happens when a sales rep walks into an operating room unprepared? Minutes are wasted, surgeon trust is shattered, and patient outcomes are put on the line. In Episode 6 of our Achieving Commercial Velocity in MedTech series, Mike and Chris dive deep into sales readiness with a powerhouse panel: orthopedic surgeon Dr. Bill Lutes, 50-year sales veteran and best-selling author Robin Durni, and veteran medical sales trainer Scott Holdsworth. Together, they break down why modern sales training is falling short, why on-the-job training without simulation sets reps up to fail, and how sales professionals can build unshakeable credibility with surgeons. In this episode, we cover:

• The Surgeon's Expectations: Why Dr. Lutes expects reps to research his fellowship and training beforehand, and why hunting through layers of an iPad during a case frustrates surgical teams.

• Relentless Preparation: Robin Durni shares his legendary routine of cutting 20 Sawbones before ever presenting a new technology to a customer.

• The "What, Why, and How": Scott Holdsworth explains how to adapt to different surgeon personality styles, and how frequent role-play bridges the gap from comfort to confidence.

Listen & Subscribe: Subscribe to the MedTech Jam Session on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite platform so you never miss an episode of our commercial velocity playbook. Equip Your Field Team: Visit Velotoro.ai to discover how mobile AI customer intelligence and sales readiness tools help reps execute in the field with confidence. Read the Playbook: Check out Robin Durni's book, The Durni Dozen: How to Use Trust and Effective Relationship-building to Create Sales Success

A crucial decision for every MedTech company is who leads the sales team and how will they organize to grow. 1099? Direct? A bit of both? In Episode 5 of our Achieving Commercial Velocity in MedTech series, Mike and Chris are joined by executive recruiter and 40-year orthopedic veteran Drue DeAngelis (founder of The DeAngelis Group) to break down the mechanics of building a medical device sales channel from scratch. Drue reveals why hiring a big-company executive with an impressive corporate pedigree is often a fatal mistake for early-stage companies. He shares actionable frameworks on how to recruit your first commercial leader, navigate the 80/20 rule of independent 1099 distributors, and avoid the trap of spreading your sales force too thin across the country. In this episode, we cover:

• The "Pedigree" Trap: Why a regional VP running a $100M business often fails at a startup, and why you need a hands-on "Swiss Army knife" who still knows how to hunt for users number one and two.

• Managing 1099 Distributors: How to navigate the reality that 80% of independent reps take product lines defensively or just sell access, and how to structure early commissions to command mindshare.

• •Costly Mis-Hires: Why commercial hiring mistakes leave a trail of carnage across surgeon and distributor relationships, and how to properly vet leadership talent.

You finally secured FDA clearance, but how do you know exactly which surgeons to target first? In Episode 4 of our Achieving Commercial Velocity in MedTech series, Mike and Chris sit down with two heavyweights in market intelligence: Isabel Wellbery (CCO, Alpha Sophia) and Joe Miesch (CCO, SmartTRAK). Joe and Isabel break down why MedTech commercial leaders need to stop obsessing over raw spreadsheets and start shrinking their "time to insight." By interconnecting claims data with fellowship histories, publication records, and site-of-care shifts, companies can remove the guesswork from their commercial launch. In this episode, we cover:

• The "10 Customer" Rule: Why startups must define their ideal customer profile so specifically that they can name their top 10 targets before trying to scale nationally.
• The AI Trap: Why relying on open-source AI tools to build your Total Addressable Market (TAM) often leads to inaccurate investor pitches, and why proprietary data is non-negotiable.
• Empowering the Field: How equipping your sales reps with real-time insights (like competitor backorders or specific procedure shifts) transforms a generic sales call into a high-value conversation

A successful product launch requires a powerhouse Key Opinion Leader (KOL) team. In Episode 3 of our Achieving Commercial Velocity in MedTech series, Mike and Chris are joined by Steven Flutie-Davis, Founder of Incirqle to discuss the strategy behind KOL selection and engagement. Steven explains why relying solely on a surgeon's academic prestige or "big name" is a commercial trap. Instead, he breaks down how his AI-driven data company helps startups identify true early adopters based on over 150 unique data points.

In this episode, we cover:

• The Rule of Three: Why having exactly three diverse KOLs provides the perfect balance to challenge your engineering and push back on bad ideas without crowding the room.

• Identifying Early Adopters: Why a surgeon's patent history—not their academic research—is the ultimate leading indicator of someone willing to take a risk on a new product.

• AI for Go-To-Market: How connecting AI to NPI and Medicare databases can deliver highly qualified distributor, and surgeon leads directly to your inbox.

To learn more about Incirqle, go to: https://www.incirqle.com/

Achieving FDA clearance is just the beginning; the real war is going to market. In Episode 2 of our Achieving Commercial Velocity in MedTech series, Mike and Chris are joined by two commercial veterans: Mark Foster (CEO of CurvaFix) and Chance Leonard (Genesis Innovation Group). They break down why commercialization cannot be an afterthought and how to build a disciplined, repeatable sales process in an increasingly complex healthcare environment.

In this episode, we cover:

• The Beachhead Strategy: Why deep penetration in a single market makes a startup vastly more valuable than shallow, nationwide sales.

• Navigating VAC: Why a product being "hung up in VAC" usually means you haven't given your surgeon champion a strong enough value proposition to spend their limited political capital.

• The Lost Art of Selling: The difference between a true salesperson and a "territory grower," and why emotional intelligence and reading the room are critical in the OR.

• Launch Timing: Why founders must start planning their commercialization, channel strategy, and reimbursement pathways while they are still creating the product.

Launching a "me too" product into a massive, established market is a recipe for a brutal slog. True commercial velocity comes from defining and dominating a new category entirely. In this episode of our special series, How to Achieve Commercial Velocity in MedTech, Mike and Chris sit down with Patrick Fisher, President of Biologics and Limb Reconstruction at Orthofix. Patrick shares the blueprint he learned while helping carve the Foot & Ankle category out of general trauma at Wright Medical, and how he is replicating that success today by building the Limb Reconstruction category at Orthofix. In this episode, we cover:The Definition of a Category: How Orthofix is defining Limb Reconstruction across four distinct pillars: limb lengthening, deformity correction, limb preservation, and complex fracture. The Power of Focus: Why Patrick’s team eliminated 30 legacy brands last year to laser-focus their commercial and R&D efforts. Fighting the Giants: The strategy for convincing IDNs and GPOs to grant specific category carve-outs, even when major incumbents play defense. Sales Channel Alignment: How to incentivize an independent distributor network to focus on a new call point without losing momentum in their core business

What is the fastest way to derail a new clinical technology? Add a single extra step to a surgeon's daily practice. In this episode, Chris and Mike D sits down with Valentin from CustomSurg to discuss why handing busy surgeons complex planning software simply doesn't work. Valentin shares his team's "aha moment" and the philosophy behind their Ortho Planner solution: "We turn scans into plans, period". By operating like an "Uber ride" rather than a "rental car," CustomSurg takes a patient's CT scan and returns a fully personalized 3D surgical plan within 24 hours for next-day surgery.

In this episode, we cover:

• The Workflow Reality: Why accommodating both highly meticulous planners and ultra-busy surgeons is critical for adoption.
• Intraoperative Guidance: How CustomSurg segments the fracture and maps 3D implant configurations directly to 2D fluoro images for seamless OR execution.
• Automated Efficiency: The value of generating an automated bill of materials that is specifically tailored to a surgeon's preferred implant vendors.

To learn more about CustomSurg, visit CustomSurg.com

Patient compliance with at-home care programs is notoriously poor, with engagement rates often sitting between 5% and 21%. But what if the secret to better outcomes isn't just about anatomy, but about intelligent data-powered recovery? In this episode of the MedTech Jam Session, Chris and Mike D sit down with Raja Sundaram, CEO of Plethy. Coming from a deep tech background, Raja brings a fresh perspective to healthcare by introducing the Plethy Recupe platform. He explains why true "intelligent MSK recovery" requires a fundamental shift from treating isolated symptoms to managing the whole recovery journey. By collecting real-time telemetry alongside psycho-social data—like sleep, stress, pain beliefs, and work-life context—Plethy empowers personalized care and accelerates recovery. In this episode, we cover:

• Whole Person Recovery: Why MSK outcomes are shaped not only by anatomy and pathology, but by a patient's beliefs on pain, stress, and family support.
• Data-Driven Intervention: How Plethy's episode-of-care management platform identifies delayed recovery risks.
• True Cost Containment: Why payer and workers' comp cost containment shouldn't be about cutting visits but rather identifying the 20% of claims that cost 80% of the money early in the recovery process.
• Human-Centric Design: How providing an easy-to-follow, personalized at-home care program with an intuitive joint motion sensor drives native English-speaking engagement rates up to 79%.

To learn more, go to: Plethy.com

What happens when a former airline navigation engineer watches an orthopedic surgeon struggle to place an acetabular cup? He decides to miniaturize airline navigation technology to ensure surgeons can "land the plane" perfectly every single time. In this episode of the MedTech Jam Session, Chris and Mike D are joined by Sujit Dike, CEO of Gyder Surgical, to discuss how their Australian-born technology is transforming hip replacements. Gyder Surgical has developed a handheld navigation unit that is entirely pinless and imageless and pinless which eliminates the need for preoperative CT scans, intraoperative fluoroscopy, and invasive pelvic pins during total hip replacement. To learn more about Gyder Surgical and pin-less and image-less navigation for anterior hip replacement, check out their website: gydersurgical.com

While navigation and robotics are transforming total joint and spine surgeries, sports medicine largely relies on manual techniques and "feel". In this episode of the MedTech Jam Session, Mike and Chris are joined by Sean Cogan, CEO of Tessa Medical, joining from Sydney, Australia, to discuss how his company is changing the paradigm in ligament reconstruction. Sean explains that while surgeons meticulously measure graft diameter and tunnel length during an ACL reconstruction, the actual tensioning of the graft is still done entirely by feel. Tesa Medical has developed an agnostic, hands-free device that allows surgeons to dial in precise tension, eliminating the guesswork and physical fatigue of manual pulling. To learn more about how Tesa helps surgeons achieve precise, reproducible tension and fixation for ACL repair, go to tesamedcorp.com