Looks like we have competition already with our new FIM technology incorporated toothbrush. Colgate has filed a patent in October 2012 for a "toothbrush capable of releasing small doses of chemicals in the users mouth for as long as three months of continued usage". Images of the toothbrush is below.
The patches delivering the drugs are located at the back of the toothbrush which could deliver chemical and flavours such as:
I find the topical pain relief and appetite suppressants to be of particular importance this opens up many avenues in which our technology can be applied.
"This innovation may also give birth to a whole new genre of medicinal toothbrush just like it happened with the introduction of pain relieving, whitening and sensitive teeth toothpastes."
The article then goes on to elaborate on the potential market opportunity of the caffeine variant of the toothbrush.
"Colgate Palmolive charges a premium of over 200% on its medicinal toothpastes like Colgate Sensitive Pro-Relief over Colgate Regular. If the company decides to charge a similar premium on its new line of toothbrushes, we can assume it to charge about $6 more than its regular ones. This translates into additional revenue of $330 million for the company. If Colgate introduces toothbrushes infused with other chemicals as discussed above that are better received like fruit flavors for instance, the revenues could see a multi-fold rise. The current market size for oral care products is about $28.6 billion. The additional revenue from the new toothbrush could boost Colgate Palmolive’s market share by almost 2%, which could make the stock’s add about 5% to its intrinsic value."
Looks to be a very interesting move by the two big names in oral healthcare thus far and if the roll out is successful and well received by consumers this could see the next new range of toothbrushes which could canabalise the old manual toothbrushes... We can only speculate. Either way with the many variations with which the technology can be applied i can't wait to see the markets reaction when GSK releases the toothbrush, accumulating once again! Looks like Glyn is in the know the next 12months looks to be extremely exciting indeed.
OBJ Price at posting:
1.4¢ Sentiment: LT Buy Disclosure: Held
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