Robots invaded the operating room years ago, providing surgeons with high precision tools to perform a wide range of procedures from prostatectomies to partial knee replacements. Now, Restoration Robotics is hoping to take over the private practices of hair restoration surgeons. Last year, the venture-backed company launched ARTAS, a robotic system capable of minimally invasive removal of hair follicles used in hair transplants. Restoration Robotics executives see ARTAS as a way to level the playing field between hair restoration surgeons who are capable of performing the sometimes tricky follicular unit extraction and those who want to offer the procedure but don’t have the skills or resources. By conservative estimates, FUE accounts for less than 20% of the $1 billion hair restoration industry. Restoration Robotics sees its robotic system enabling more surgeons to perform FUEs, which could convince more prospective patients to undergo a hair restoration procedure.
Doug Kelly gave new meaning to the colloquialism “putting your own skin in the game.” The phrase normally applies to an investor willing to risk his or her own money as a clear vote of confidence in a company with a still undetermined future. However Kelly, general partner at Alloy Ventures, put his actual skin into the game in December. Bald most of his adult life, Kelly chose to undergo a hair transplant procedure using the ARTAS system, the robotic hair retrieval system manufactured by Restoration Robotics Inc., one of his own portfolio companies. Kelly never was comfortable with his baldness, but he was less comfortable with the surgical options available to remedy it. His decision to undergo the procedure using the ARTAS robot only happened because he had confidence that the new device could reliably produce the result he wanted.
Kelly’s change of heart is an early indicator of a robotic revolution Restoration Robotics might be bringing to the aesthetics...
