SFSK is really on the move today (granted, today is a hot market).
I thought thread-readers here might find this item, yanked from the Yahoo board, to be informative:
Subj: Maxxim
By: MaryLopez
Date: Jan 23 1998 12:40 P.M PST
Reply To: Msg. 56 by amba1911
Al:
I enjoyed your comments about Maxxim. I thought that you might appreciate a few comments from a user
of gloves. In December
of 1995, NIOSH published a standard on occupational use of gloves. The standard was in response to an
increasing problem of
healthcare workers and patients with congenital anomolies developing life threatening reactions to latex.
The medical product with the
highest amount of extractable latex proteins is gloves. Therefore, the standard focused on these.
According to the standard, when
gloves are worn for universal precautions (handling blood or body fluids) the gloves should be latex,
powderless, and low allergen.
Vinyl gloves are not adequate because of a very high failure rate during use. They do not adequately
protect the wearer. This is
very important for investers in SFSK. I estimate that currently less than 5% of hospitals are in compliance
with this standard,
although the number is rapidly increasing. Therefore, there is a lot of room for growth in SFSK.
You mentioned Maxxim, a company that bought the glove division of Becton Dickenson. This company
has a very small profit
margin and is primarily involved in assembling supplies from manufacturers into custom procedural trays
that are used in
healthcare. Maxxim has been marketing an exam glove that is made of vinyl and costs more than latex
gloves. The glove is stretchy for
vinyl, but does not meet the NIOSH standard for use when handling blood and body fluids. The company
pushes the glove as "nonlatex"
and avoids the word "vinyl".
Safeskin has a full product line of gloves and will be coming out with a thin microsurgical glove soon.
Having this full line will allow hospitals to sign sole vendor contracts with the company, meaning that all
(>80%) of their gloves will be purchased from SFSK. Most hospitals buy through multi-hospital
corsortia that negotiate a set price. SFSK is the only glove company that has the capacity to fill these huge
contracts. Even SFSK is backordered and struggling to fill orders.
Ansell Perry subcontracts their gloves and they have gotten to be very poor quality. They also cannot fill
orders.
There is a lot of room for growth with SFSK. With all of healthcare changing to meet the NIOSH
standard, we investors should be pleased with what we see in the next three years. |
