Like most OEMs, Samsung Electronics America wants more facilities to use its medical equipment products.

Last week, the company launched Samsung Financial Solutions to help customers finance and acquire capital equipment, which is normally one of the more expensive purchases for a facility.

Similar to a leasing program, Samsung Financial Solutions would give facilities access, through the company, to financial solutions in order to purchase its medical equipment such as mobile CT units.
"Giving customers the ability to get competitive rates to get access to equipment is important, and with Samsung Financial Solutions we know what rates we're giving our customers and we can stay competitive in the market," Doug Ryan, group vice president for health and medical equipment at Samsung, told DOTmed News.

While Ryan was only able to speak generally at this time about the new program, he said that candidates would be evaluated based on their credit status as well as the long-term health of their business.

Ryan said they created the program based on demand from customers. Already, roughly 85-90 percent of the capital purchasing transactions Samsung is involved with today are financed in one way or another, according to Ryan.

The Korean electronics giant has been working on becoming a major player in the medical equipment space these past few years with diagnostic imaging product releases as well as major acquisitions, including NeuroLogica Corp., a company best known for its mobile CT scanners. This year, Samsung released its first digital radiology system, the XGEO GC80.

"Typically as we go more and more into the hospital realm as we continue to grow our footprint here in U.S., it [financing] will become a greater demand as well," said Ryan.

Samsung isn't the only OEM experimenting with alternative financing models, however. This summer, Philips Healthcare announced a unique partnership with Georgia Regents Medical Center, a public academic health system in Augusta, Georgia. Philips will provide the medical center with a comprehensive range of advanced medical technologies and imaging equipment, planning and maintenance services, and consumer products with predetermined monthly operational costs over a 15-year period. Philips will own, manage and service all of Georgia Regent's imaging equipment.

Philips has made similar collaborations in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa.

NOTE FROM EDITOR: Do you think OEMs are going to start promoting leasing versus owning equipment? What might be the ramifications? Please give us your feedback.

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