Dec 14, 2009 USA: Several billion dollars a year are spent in the off-site hauling of regulated medical waste, so there is tremendous market opportunity. Companies in the market for on-site treatment of waste are small and fragmented, but that is a largely untapped market when compared to some of the more traditional hauling and disposal services offered by sector leader Stericycle
Last week, headlines hit the news wires that will impact the stock price of smaller medical waste companies after, Stericycle said it had agreed to a Department of Justice demand to sell off some of its medical waste collection businesses in four states to settle an antitrust lawsuit and finalize its $182.5 million acquisition of MedServe Inc.
The opportunity affords smaller players in the field a shot at a multi-billion dollar market that renews every year. Especially publicly traded companies who can absorb more work and take on the addititional capital needed to compete.
Hospitals, clinics and even home users never stop making infectious waste. So, it is a very under-penetrated market and no company has emerged with the capability and scalability to be a significant player and we need to be that significant player.
One company, Biomedical Technology Solutions (BMTL.OB). provides safe and environmentally sound medical waste disposal equipment for sharps and red bag waste, commonly found in medical, dental, veterinary, nursing, assisted living, and other health care facilities.
Its product, known as the Demolizer® II, allows the medical staff to safely, and inexpensively dispose of medical waste that would normally be subject to expensive medical waste hauling.
It uses a rather unique “personal copier” sized solution called Demolizer®. II- a patented treatment process that uses dry heat to render waste 99.9999 percent sterile, and sharps (injection needles) non-reusable.
The treated waste then is properly labeled and thrown away as common trash.
The solution sounds simple enough, but the science and cost-savings proposal for the patient care market, including medical offices, dental offices, urgent care centers, nursing homes, and assisted living facilities; and veterinary care market, which include veterinary hospitals, emergency veterinary care, livestock medicine, equine medicine, zoos, and sanctuaries is tremendous and perhaps more importantly for small cap investors a great opportunity to get into the very hot regulated medical waste sector which sees stocks trade at up to 25 times earnings (as compared to more typical 3 to 4 times earnings found in other sectors of the market.