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March 2005

Tom Novotny

Tom Novotny, president of the custom seating division of Sunrise Medical, Carlsbad, Calif, called AES Group, spoke with Rehab Management about the recent changes in his company that will help propel its product lines to greater levels within the seating industry. The AES Group consists of RehabiliTech, Kansas City, Kan; Whitmyer Biomechanix, Tallahassee, Fla; and Adaptive Equipment Systems (AES), which has locations in Baltimore, San Francisco, and Seattle.

Q: What’s new at AES?
A: What’s very exciting for us is to become part of Sunrise Medical. Sunrise Medical is 100% dedicated to finding solutions and serving the needs of the end users, primary care providers, and finally the dealer/providers of our equipment. In addition to AES, Sunrise also purchased Whitmyer Biomechanix, Tallahassee, Fla, and RehabiliTech, Kansas City, Kan, enabling the company to be placed in key areas geographically. All the divisions of the company have the same mission: we know that making money is important, but we all realize that if we take care of the people who need our product first, the rest will take care of itself.

Q: What is AES’ niche within the industry, now that it is part of Sunrise Medical?
A: As part of the AES Group, a division of Sunrise Medical that will provide the high-end custom seating and positioning for the Sunrise family of products, AES’ main goal now is to use the strength of all the companies, especially technological strength, to improve products. We also want to streamline the overall process of ordering to make it easier for the dealer/providers. Currently, the dealers will purchase the wheelchairs from Sunrise Medical, or another manufacturer, and then purchase seating from AES, and the two transactions would have to be combined somehow; we intend to streamline this, which will be much easier for the dealer.

Q: How will being a part of Sunrise help AES?
A: Being a part of Sunrise enables us to take advantage of the engineering expertise that they have; we could not have that as a small company. This will enable us to improve and increase the speed of product development. We have many items that were in development prior to the acquisition and some new developments postacquisition that are in the works. Many of the products will be rolled out at upcoming trade shows.

Q: What do you envision happening in the future of the seating industry?
A: I expect to see more consolidation of companies. Also, because of the funding pressures and the current reimbursement schedules, we are going to see that the companies that meet the needs of the end users and, at the same time, find a way to work within the government and coding regulations are going to be the ones that survive. With regard to the funding pressure, we are heavily involved with that almost on a daily basis at the highest levels, so we intend to help that process along, taking into account the needs of our customers. We look at all of this as a challenge, but also as an opportunity to see how we can fit within the changing structure of the industry.

-By Arati Murti

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