Intuitive Surgical Results Beat on Growing Demand for Surgical Robots

Representation photo: Employees work at the office of humanoid robots developer Ex-Robots in Dalian, Liaoning province, China June 6, 2024. REUTERS/Florence Lo
Representation photo: Employees work at the office of humanoid robots developer Ex-Robots in Dalian, Liaoning province, China June 6, 2024. REUTERS/Florence Lo
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Intuitive Surgical Results Beat on Growing Demand for Surgical Robots

Representation photo: Employees work at the office of humanoid robots developer Ex-Robots in Dalian, Liaoning province, China June 6, 2024. REUTERS/Florence Lo
Representation photo: Employees work at the office of humanoid robots developer Ex-Robots in Dalian, Liaoning province, China June 6, 2024. REUTERS/Florence Lo

Intuitive Surgical on Thursday beat estimates for second-quarter profit and revenue on growing demand for its surgical robots used in minimally invasive procedures, sending its shares up 6.7% after the bell.
Investor expectations around medical device makers have grown lately on hopes of elevated demand for surgical procedures as people, especially older adults, opt for medical procedures deferred during the pandemic, Reuters said.
On an adjusted basis, Intuitive earned $1.78 per share for the quarter ended June 30, beating analysts' estimates of $1.54 per share, according to LSEG data.
The company reported quarterly revenue of $2.01 billion, compared with analysts' estimates of $1.97 billion.
The rise in revenue was driven in part by growth in the procedure volume from the company's surgical robots called da Vinci. Worldwide da Vinci procedure volumes rose about 17%, from a year ago, the company said.
Industry bellwether Johnson & Johnson on Wednesday posted a 2.2% rise in second quarter sales at its medical technology business, but fell short of analysts' estimates.
Larger peer Abbott Laboratories also raised its annual profit forecast, helped by double-digit growth in sales of its glucose monitors and strong demand for heart devices.



Microsoft Halts China-based Tech Support for Pentagon Systems

FILE - The Microsoft company logo is displayed at their offices in Sydney, Australia, on Feb. 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)
FILE - The Microsoft company logo is displayed at their offices in Sydney, Australia, on Feb. 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)
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Microsoft Halts China-based Tech Support for Pentagon Systems

FILE - The Microsoft company logo is displayed at their offices in Sydney, Australia, on Feb. 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)
FILE - The Microsoft company logo is displayed at their offices in Sydney, Australia, on Feb. 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft, File)

Microsoft said Friday it is making sure that personnel based in China are not providing technical support for US Defense Department systems, after investigative news site ProPublica revealed the practice earlier this week.

Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth confirmed that work on Defense Department cloud services had been outsourced to people in China, insisting that the country will not have "any involvement whatsoever" with the department's systems going forward.

"Microsoft has made changes to our support for US Government customers to assure that no China-based engineering teams are providing technical assistance for DoD Government cloud and related services," the company's chief communications officer, Frank Shaw, said in a post on X.

ProPublica reported Tuesday that the tech giant was using engineers based in China -- Washington's primary military rival -- to maintain Pentagon computer systems, with only limited supervision by US personnel who often lacked the necessary expertise to do the job effectively.

US Senator Tom Cotton asked Hegseth to look into the matter in a letter dated Thursday, and the Pentagon chief responded that he would do so.

Hegseth then posted a video on X Friday evening in which he said "it turns out that some tech companies have been using cheap Chinese labor to assist with DoD cloud services. This is obviously unacceptable, especially in today's digital threat environment."

"At my direction, the department will... initiate -- as fast as we can -- a two-week review, or faster, to make sure that what we uncovered isn't happening anywhere else across the DoD," AFP quoted him as saying.

"We will continue to monitor and counter all threats to our military infrastructure and online networks," he added, thanking "all those Americans out there in the media and elsewhere who raised this issue to our attention so we could address it."