Invacare realigns team

ELYRIA, Ohio - Invacare is a company in transition, Chairman, President and CEO Matthew Monaghan told investors during a conference call on July 23 to discuss the company's financial results for the second quarter of 2015.

“As CEO, I've spent the last few month focusing the organization on two critical priorities: building a strong sustainable quality culture, and generating profitable growth,” he said. “There are a number of transition activities underway to make that happen, primarily in the North America HME segment, where we're aligning the team to execute.”

For North America/HME, Invacare reported a net loss of $7.8 million for the second quarter of 2015 compared to a net loss of $14.3 million for the same period in 2014. It reported net sales of $119 million vs. $134.3 million. The company reported a net loss of $16.7 million for the six months ended June 30, 2015, compared to a net loss of $32.3 million for the same period in 2014. It reported net sales of $244.2 million vs. $258.9 million.

Monaghan acknowledged that the first priority, building a strong sustainable quality culture, “remains in progress” as Invacare continues to work toward completing a third expert certification.

“While we are not talking about the timing of the third-party certification audit, I want to assure you that establishing a strong culture that will enable us to exit the injunctive phase of the consent decree is the No. 1 priority of the organization,” he said.

On the second priority, generating profitable growth, Monaghan shared that Invacare has appointed Dean Childers as the senior vice president and general manager of the North America/HME and Institutional Products Group segments. Monaghan has worked with Childers for more than 10 years in private equity and medical device organizations.

“He has a proven ability to assess a company's strength and opportunities, and link customer needs with innovative solutions,” Monaghan said.

Additionally, to generate profitable growth, Invacare has been retraining its sales force.

“The charge overall is sales effectivity, which is everything from opportunity alignment, to training and knowledge base, to brushing up on consultative sales skills, to making sure that our sales team is very in tune with the clinical outcomes that we can provide,” Monaghan said. “We want to make sure that we are aligning our consultative skills-based sales organization toward the appropriate mix of clinical complex solutions and looking for efficiencies to drive everywhere else in the organization in terms of how we provide products and solutions to market. And that takes time.”

Overall, Invacare reported a net loss of $8.2 million for the second quarter of 2015 compared to a net loss of $13.6 million for the same period in 2014. It reported net sales of $286.3 million vs. $326.9 million.

The company reported a net loss of $15.5 million for the six months ended June 30, 2015, compared to a net loss of $31.6 million for the same period in 2014. It reported net sales of $575.3 million vs. $631.4 million.