SonoSite Wins Premier Contract to Provide Hand-Carried Ultrasound across Clinical Applications; Leading Health Care Group Purchasing Organization Adds State-of-Art, Hand-Carried Ultrasound Systems to Its National Contract Portfolio
Categories: Health AccessoriesBOTHELL, Wash. — SonoSite, Inc. (Nasdaq:SONO), the world leader in hand-carried ultrasound, today announced it has signed a new three-year, group purchasing agreement with Premier Purchasing Partners, LP for hand-carried ultrasound equipment, accessories and service. Premier Inc. is a strategic healthcare alliance entirely owned by more than 200 of the nation’s leading not-for-profit hospital and healthcare systems. These organizations operate or are affiliated with nearly 1,400 hospital facilities and 37,000 other care sites.
“SonoSite has had a long-standing relationship with Premier and we are pleased to again be selected as a provider of hand-carried ultrasound systems across the broad spectrum of clinical applications,” said Kevin M. Goodwin, SonoSite President and CEO. “Our aim is to help clinicians in the Premier system deliver the highest quality care by designing ultrasound systems that can provide immediate answers and procedural guidance at the point of patient care.”
With the broadest product line in the hand-carried ultrasound market, SonoSite is well positioned to serve the diverse needs of Premier’s members and affiliates. Versatile and durable, SonoSite’s hand-carried systems reduce the time, risk and expense of transporting patients to an imaging center by providing high-quality imaging at the bedside or wherever the patient is located. SonoSite systems are designed to withstand the rigors of highly mobile use, can be battery operated for hours, and boot up in seconds for immediate scanning.
SonoSite’s newest product, the MicroMaxx(TM) system, which incorporates SonoSite’s third generation of hand-carried ultrasound technology, began shipping in June 2005 and represents a revolutionary crossover point between hand-carried and cart-based systems. Weighing approximately eight pounds and with the size and appearance of a notebook computer, the MicroMaxx system delivers high-resolution image quality at a fraction of the cost of larger, heavier cart-based systems. It is so durable that a 5-year warranty on the system and most of its transducers comes standard, dramatically lowering ownership costs in an industry that typically charges 7-10% of a product’s purchase price in annual service contracts.