The Biologic Shift

While I’ve touched on the growing field of biologics within the orthopedic industry (most recently observed during my trip to the NASS annual meeting in Boston last year), I haven’t had too many opportunities to speak with the providers of these innovative offerings. As such, while attending the NASS event, I was sure to meet up with a representative from Bioventus—a company that provides these more natural-based alternatives exclusively.
 
Although I’ve spoken with Bioventus in the past, this was my first introduction to the Surgical division. To address the questions I had regarding this division and its offerings for the spinal sector, Steven Moore, a senior product manager with Bioventus Surgical, was kind enough to take time out to address my queries. In this interview, Moore shares his insights on the company, the biologics offerings, and what he expects in the near future.
 
Sean Fenske: Can you please provide a bit of background information on Bioventus?
Steven Moore: Bioventus was established in 2012, spun out of the biologics division of Smith & Nephew. The company is privately held and headquartered in Durham, N.C., with its international headquarters in Hoofddorp, The Netherlands. Bioventus also has offices in Memphis, Tenn.; Newport Beach, Calif.; Australia, and Canada, as well as a research and development site in Boston.
 
The company has two product portfolios for orthobiologics—Bioventus Active Healing Therapies and Bioventus Surgical—which were created and continue to evolve through a combination of internal product development, product/business acquisition, and distribution agreements.
 
Fenske: How rapidly are orthobiologics growing within the orthopedics industry?
Moore: A recent study by iDATA Research indicated the global orthobiologics market stood at $4.3 billion in 2014, and is predicted to reach $5.9 billion in 2021.
 
Fenske: What’s driving the growth and/or the shift away from more traditional technologies?
Moore: Surgeons are continually looking for solutions that may provide greater patient benefit through technological advances and often look for what may be new, effective, and interesting to use in the clinic and OR. However, traditional technologies still play a prominent role due to their ability to deliver outcomes in different patient populations and may facilitate their ability to achieve cost control measures including consolidation of vendors at hospital systems and healthcare facilities. These measures have led to the closer assessment of new technologies to ensure they can reduce costs and/or achieve better patient outcomes.
 
Fenske: Your spine portfolio was the result of a number of acquisitions. What made these technologies particularly attractive?
Moore: The surgical business at Bioventus was started in the fall of 2014. We have pursued a strategy that would quickly give us a broad portfolio to meet the needs of both physicians and healthcare facilities to include premium and value-based offerings of allograft, cell and marrow, and synthetic solutions. We also wanted to invest in products that are differentiated and backed by clinical data, without compromising ease-of-use factors like having great handling properties.
 
Fenske: Are you seeking to further expand your spinal fusion fill portfolio or perhaps even seek out a biologic alternative to spinal fusion entirely?
Moore: We are always seeking products to add to our surgical orthobiologics portfolio that fit within our strategic corporate plan, meet an unmet clinical need, are backed by clinical data, and/or provide positive outcomes for surgeons and patients.
 
Fenske: How do your products differ from comparative technologies on the market? What’s unique about them?
Moore: We group our portfolio into three categories: allograft, cell and marrow, and synthetic. Within each category, we have a flagship offering. For allograft, it is Osteoamp; for cell & marrow, Cellxtract; and for synthetic, it is Signafuse.
 
Osteoamp maintains and preserves a wide array of naturally occurring growth factors found in bone and bone marrow, is supported by clinical data and positive patient outcomes, and is more cost effective than comparable offerings.
 
Signafuse is the only synthetic bone graft substitute on the market that combines bioglass, hydroxyapatite, and beta-tricalcium phosphate in an optimized ratio, which kick starts and supports the body’s natural regenerative healing process.

Cellxtract is a unique technology designed to reduce the dilution of peripheral blood, maximize the number of cells collected in bone marrow aspirate, and complement both our allograft and synthetic offerings.
 
Fenske: What do you foresee in terms of biologics for the spinal space? What’s coming in five to ten years?
Moore: We believe biologic technologies designed to fit a more minimally invasive approach, including patient specificity, will appear on the market. We also expect stem cells will continue to collect clinical data and evolve in their product iterations. In addition, Bioventus expects to launch its next generation designer bone morphogenetic protein (BMP) during this time frame.
 
The following video provides a look at how the company’s Osteoamp product works for spinal fusion.