Sources inform ''Globes'' that dental implant AB Dental Ltd. has signed a distribution agreement with Taiwan's BenQ Corporation. The two companies will establish a joint venture, BenQ Dental Healthcare Ltd., to distribute AB Dental's implants among BenQ's dentists in the Asia Pacific region. BenQ will provide 80% of the several millions dollars the companies will invest in the joint venture, and AB Dental will invest 20%. The joint venture will order several million dollars worth of AB Dental's products a year.
Ashdod-based AB Dental manufactures dental implants and computerized implant planning systems, CAD implants and prosthetics. The company was founded by Eliezer Bar-Shalom and CEO Ofra Bar-Shalom and operates as a family business. Ofra Ben-Shalom says that the company was a pioneer in the sale of combined implants and computer-aided planning, and that the whole industry is now headed in that direction.
Israel has a number of leading dental implant companies, but AB Dental is one of the few companies still under Israeli ownership. AlphaBio-Tec Ltd. was acquired by Switzerland's Nobel Biocare (SWX: NOBN) for $95 million in 2008, and MIS MIS Implants Technologies Ltd. was acquired by TA Associates Management LP for an estimated $100 million in 2011. All these companies grew from the ground up, initially producing implants similar to products on the market, and gradually upgrading the products and marketing and distribution networks.
The Bar-Shalom family lives in Moshav Nir Galim. Eliezer Bar-Shalom was the manager of the moshav engraving plant, which produced parts for the Lavie combat jet in the early 1980s. When the program was cancelled, the plant fell on hard time. "Those were difficult times for us," Ofra Bar-Shalom told "Globes", "but we had a contingency plan. My mother worked at a dental clinic's computer and we knew all the dentists. Eliezer had engraving skills, and the connection resulted in the dental implants enterprise." Three of the couple's five children work at the company, which has 100 employees, and another is its legal adviser.
AB Dental initially manufactured implants similar to current products with small technological improvements. Its breakthrough to premium products was the introduction of computer planning to create a comprehensive product. The CT scans and computer planning eliminated the need to cut open a patient's gums to plan an implant, to avoid damaging the sinuses or bone, and to precisely plan an implant's fit in the upper or lower jaw.
"We didn’t invent computer planning and guidance, but we made it accessible to dentists for all implants, compared with the previous situation in which it was only used for especially complex procedures. The accessibility was made possible because we do everything in-house," says Ofra Bar-Shalom.
AB Dental has an independent global marketing network. "We decided that we needed greater financial wherewithal to become stronger in marketing, so we linked up with BenQ," says Ofra Bar-Shalom. "Later, we hope to sign similar agreements with other large companies."
"Globes": Do you ultimately plan for BenQ to acquire you or the joint venture?
Ofra Bar-Shalom: "Absolutely not."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on March 18, 2014
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