Article Excerpt:
TWST: We would like to begin with a brief historical sketch of CompuMed and a picture of the things you are doing at the present time.Mr. McLaughlin: CompuMed has been in business for more than 30 years and the company was originally founded to participate in the telemedicine market. In fact, our core business is the remote interpretation of ECGs, electrocardiograms, if you will. We place specially designed ECG machines into remote locations where doctors don't want to go or can't go, and the data is sent back to our central servers here in Los Angeles for evaluation. Reports are immediately sent out, and cardiologist overreads are available upon demand on a 24/7 basis. We have been transitioning to a medical imaging applications business, where we have a software system that can diagnose bone disease, such as osteoporosis, from an X-ray of the hand. We acquired this technology more than 10 years ago and licensed it to Merck & Co. They used it extensively during their clinical trials for their blockbuster drug Fosamax and then gave it back to us at the conclusion of the trials. Thereafter, we searched for a viable strategy for the product and decided that the optimal use was to convert the software program to a DICOM system. DICOM is the computer protocol for digital X-ray machines. The strategy is to integrate the application onto new and existing digital X-ray machines and partner up with the companies in that business. We currently have licensing agreements with Fuji Medical USA, Orex, which is a division of Eastman Kodak, and Swissray. In fact, you might be interested to know that we just announced an exclusive agreement with Kodak China for our DICOM product, where they will be distributing the product in the People's Republic. Kodak is the market leader in digital X-ray in China, and China represents the world's largest osteoporosis market. There are more than 125 million post-menopausal women in China. On the bone side of our business, customers are globally going digital, and I believe it's just obvious that medical facilities want to eliminate film, darkrooms and messy chemicals. In addition, they want to free up space and make it easier to store, transport and manipulate images. That's an important trend. Regarding competition, most of the manufacturers of digital X-ray machines have focused on their equipment platforms. They have not focused on diagnostic applications, so we are the only company in our field that is evaluating bone disease in the manner we employ. Although we do have a direct competitor in DEXA technology, emerging nations will never be able to afford the equipment. DEXA is an expensive, dedicated piece of scanning equipment that requires a dedicated room and specially trained technicians.
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