WideMed, GE Healthcare begin Morpheus pilot

WideMed predicts that sales of sleep apnea monitor will begin in the first quarter of 2010.

WideMed's share rose 30.6% on the TASE to NIS 1.67, giving a market cap of NIS 20 million.

WideMed and GE Healthcare signed a distribution agreement for Morpheus in April 2007. The agreement stipulates that GE Healthcare will include Morpheus in its monitors for patients in intensive care. WideMed believes that its product provides additional information to the medical data obtained from current monitors, including GE Healthcare's. Morpheus monitors sleep apnea without the need to monitor the patient's brain waves.

It is difficult to estimate WideMed's potential revenue from Morpheus because it is not known how much GE Healthcare will invest in marketing it. When the agreement was signed in 2007, WideMed president and CEO Anya Eldan said, "If GE Healthcare succeeds in marketing the software into just 10% of its devices, without any expansion on its part, we'll make $7 million revenue.

In August 2008, WideMed announced that installation of Morpheus in GE Healthcare monitors was delayed for technological reasons. During the past two years, WideMed has sold Morpheus independently, and made few notices to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE). The company's share plummeted accordingly.

WideMed posted NIS 1.8 million revenue in the first half of 2009, unchanged from the first half of 2008.

Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on November 23, 2009

© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2009