The Sunnyvale, California-based company faced a number of hurdles in the June quarter. China's anti-corruption campaign in healthcare disrupted the market. The company also faced the impact of a doctors' strike in South Korea, weight-loss pills that led to a drop in the number of weight-loss surgeries, and a still-tight supply chain. However, Intuitive Surgical reported adjusted earnings of $1.78 per share on sales of $2.01 billion for the June quarter. Both metrics exceeded expectations, growing 25% and 14%, respectively, and Intuitive Surgical's business has underlying momentum and upside potential as these headwinds stabilize/improve through 2024 and especially 2025″. Importantly, the number of surgeries performed using Intuitive Surgical's main product, the da Vinci system, increased 17% year-over-year in the June quarter. According to FactSet, this number exceeded expectations by 15%. The 14% increase in the number of surgeries came despite a median decline in the number of bariatric surgeries in the United States. General surgery using da Vinci and lung biopsies using the Ion system made up for the decline in bariatric surgery. Ion procedures grew 80% year over year. Intuitive Surgical increased its Ion installed base by 56% in the quarter and expanded in key regions such as China. Notably, Intuitive Surgical is in the process of rolling out its new da Vinci 5 system, and in the June quarter, the company placed 70 of its next-generation robots. This is up from eight in the first quarter.
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