Career Decisions After Your Surgical Robotic or Digital Health Company Gets Acquired.

The Medtronic / Mazor transaction that took place last week has a number of questions coming my way.

??? Should I stay with “big company” Medtronic?

??? I did not have a non-compete when I was with Mazor, but if I stay at Medtronic I will be required to sign one. Should I?

??? I really liked the startup environment and I am not sure how it will be in a larger, slower moving company, what should I be thinking about?

In an emerging landscape such as surgical robotics, diagnostic robotics and digital health, expect more transaction activity to be coming down this path over the next 24 months.

Mergers and acquisitions in aggregate will be the playbook for building out surgical/diagnostic/digital platforms over the next few years. There are just too many specific areas that require over the top excellence such as imaging, navigation, software, work flow development, planning and training.

Johnson & Johnson needs a robot somewhere in one of their portfolios, even if it is an orthopaedic robotic platform like Medtronic now has with the addition of Mazor.

Intuitive Surgical right now is going to safely lead the surgical robotic space over the next 2 to 3 years but will likely be on a buying spree sooner than later as they have a lot of cash and most definitely need to build out a larger ecosystem than what they have today.

Mergers and acquisitions in aggregate will be the playbook for building out surgical/diagnostic/digital platforms over the next few years.

Smaller companies will also contribute to the transactions. I have been meeting with a dozen different emerging medtech startups and they are all of the collaboration mindset versus the old-school “black window skunk works” lets build it alone mentality.

Ok, now back to the questions:

Should I stay with “big company” Medtronic?

It depends what your goals are. You have a few things to consider:

Go through the transaction and transition, you will likely learn a lot. You will also likely become frustrated with big company SOP’s. If you enjoyed the foot to the pedal / live or die environment of an emerging tech startup, it is unlikely you will enjoy the big company world for too long.

If you stay with the acquisition, you will only get more experience on the same platform you already have a lot of experience on anyway. You will be trading away the ability to learn a new platform and get an additional set of experiences and skills on your resume. I explained to a robotic rockstar recently that their value in the market will be greater 3 years from now if they had went to another robotic/digital startup and took that technology to market or acquisition.

If you hang in there for the year and cash-in your retention bonus, it will not hurt you too. By the time the music stops, the chairs and game players settle into their roles, it will be time for you to make a decision on whether to stay or go. You will have a few more dollars and a new experience in the bank.

I did not have a non-compete when I was with Mazor, but if I stay at Medtronic I will be required to sign one. Should I?

Take the retention bonus and the additional pay. Keep in mind that you will need to sign a non-compete that will likely be tighter than the one you were under. Most large organizations will “request” that you have to sign away all right to work on anything that ever looked like, smelled like or even could be similar to anything ever worked on in this universe or any other universe.

If you stay with the acquisition, you will only get more experience on the same platform you already have a lot of experience on anyway. You will be trading away the ability to learn a new platform and get an additional set of experiences and skills on your resume.

I am being a little facetious here, but you get it. I strongly recommend that you only sign away your ability work on a robotic application in that specific therapy. As an example, in the Mazor case, robotics in spinal surgery. Spinal does not mean neuro.

I really liked the startup environment and I am not sure how it will be in a larger, slower moving company, what should I be thinking about?

You were lucky enough to be in a startup that got acquired and had a happy ending. Not all are like that. Enjoy the next few weeks. By now, you have been temporarily numbed by the intial slow-down in all activities during the Mazor – Medtronic courting process. Then came the blackout period, management supposedly could not talk to the other given that Medtronic is a publicly traded company and it was radio-silence during this transition.

By now you should be getting a bit itchy to get back to the “hair on fire” attitude and work rate that got the company to this point. Be prepared for the transition, chain of command, new processes, paperwork, new rules and frustrations. Please note that I did not say they were bad, I merely described what was going to happen.

In a dynamic robotic / digital medtech landscape, it is very valuable to be in on the early successes. Those are who typically gets hired when a new emerging tech startup is getting off the ground. I get the requests all the time. “Get me someone from the so-and-so deal”

There is no right or wrong in your decisions. It is rarely straight forward. This is seriously a good thing. Being on the leading edge of this activity is a fantastic place to be and indicative of the exciting times ahead in the medical device market.