A Great Product vs. a Great Business: Interview with EDAP TMS CEO Ryan Rhodes

In this episode of Medsider Radio, we sat down with Ryan Rhodes, CEO of EDAP TMS. EDAP is changing prostate cancer treatment through Focal One, a robotic high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) system that doesn’t require the use of surgery or radiation.  Ryan has over 30 years of experience in market development, with two decades focused on medical robotics. Before EDAP, Ryan was CEO of Restoration Robotics, where he guided the company to a successful merger with Venus Concept. He spent 13+ years at Intuitive Surgical, establishing the global Urology franchise, which became the company’s entry point for broader adoption of the da Vinci system. He also spent 11 years at Ethicon (J&J) in sales, marketing, and market development. In this interview, Ryan challenges founders to ask: Are you creating a scalable medtech solution or a product with limited growth potential? He unpacks why standardization and scalability are critical for adoption, how clinical data fuels credibility and reimbursement, and why early adopters take the biggest risks — but also reap the biggest rewards. Before we dive into the discussion, I wanted to mention a few things: First, if you’re into learning from medical device and health technology founders and CEOs, and want to know when new interviews are live, head over to Medsider.com and sign up for our free newsletter. Second, if you want to peek behind the curtain of the world's most successful startups, you should consider a Medsider premium membership. You’ll learn the strategies and tactics that founders and CEOs use to build and grow companies like Silk Road Medical, AliveCor, Shockwave Medical, and hundreds more! We recently introduced some fantastic additions exclusively for Medsider premium members, including playbooks, which are curated collections of our top Medsider interviews on key topics like capital fundraising and risk mitigation, and 3 packages that will help you make use of our database of 750+ life science investors more efficiently for your fundraise and help you discover your next medical device or health technology investor! In addition to the entire back catalog of Medsider interviews over the past decade, premium members also get a copy of every volume of Medsider Mentors at no additional cost, including the latest Medsider Mentors Volume VII. If you’re interested, go to medsider.com/subscribe to learn more. Lastly, if you'd rather read than listen, here's a link to the full interview with Ryan Rhodes.