Dental Tribune South Africa Edition

2 Local News Dental Tribune South African Edition - December 2013 (continued from Page 1) Entering a new market Henry Schein as a global leader in dental, medical and animal health practitioner products focuses on providing its clients with excellent customer service and relationship building. Both The Dental Warehouse and Henry Schein as well as Litha Healthcare Group focus on providing their customers with top quality service and after sales service. The entry of Henry Schein into the South African dental market can be seen as a stepping stone into expanding into the rest of Africa, a continent of 1 billion people. Not only is South Africa an exciting and growing market but so is the rest of Africa where massive amounts of investment are taking place and is an area with vast business potential. “We are very ambitious about growing in Africa and that’s something we want to take new technology and product lines and to work out how to expand our business in Africa” said Gordon Anderson the General Manager of Henry Schein Halas in Australia and who is also on the management team for Henry Schein South Africa. He will be overseeing the transition of the Dental Warehouse into a Henry Schein Company and was in South Africa for the handover. Through its new partnership with The Dental Warehouse and Litha Healthgroup and their various expertise and markets, Henry Schein aims to become a complete healthcare business both in South Africa and Africa as a whole. Anderson stressed that Henry Schein, “Looks at sales and marketing as being a critical part of our growth strategy” and is seen as one of the specific focus areas of when they enter a new market. Following on from sales and marketing are other key areas for a company to operate efficiently and effectively in the dental trade such as operations and logistics. “We remain focused on the operations side… operations is absolutely critical.” he said, “We have to get the sales and marketing and the distribution piece; we have to be excellent at it and if we are then we’ll be the top dental company.” Even though Litha Healthcare Group will be a minority partner to Henry Schein, CEO Selwyn Kahanovitz sees Litha’s joining of From left to right: Louis Ichikowitz, Co-Founder of The Dental Warehouse; Eric Serebro, Joint Managing Director of The Dental Warehouse; Melanie Savvides, Joint Managing Director of The Dental Warehouse; Gordon Anderson, Henry Schein Halas General Manager (Australia); Selwyn Kahanovitz, CEO of Litha Healthcare Group and Nomo Khumalo, Management Associate at Henry Schein Europe. DENTAL TRIBUNEThe World’s Dental Newspaper · South African Edition GROUP EDITOR Daniel Zimmermann newsroom@dental-tribune.com +49 341 48 474 107 CLINICAL EDITOR Magda Wojtkiewicz ONLINE EDITORS Yvonne Bachmann Claudia Duschek COPY EDITORS Sabrina Raaff, Hans Motschmann PUBLISHER/PRESIDENT/CEO Torsten Oemus DIRECTOR OF FINANCE & CONTROLLING Dan Wunderlich BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER Claudia Slawiczek MEDIA SALES MANAGERS Matthias Diessner (Key Accounts) Melissa Brown (International) Peter Witteczek (Asia Pacific) Maria Kaiser (USA) Weridiana Mageswki (Latin America) Hélène Carpentier (Europe) MARKETING & SALES SERVICES Esther Wodarski, Nicole Andrä ACCOUNTING Karen Hamatschek, Anja Maywald EXECUTIVE PRODUCER Gernot Meyer INTERNATIONAL EDITORIAL BOARD Dr Nasser Barghi, Ceramics, USA Dr Karl Behr, Endodontics, Germany Dr George Freedman, Esthetics, Canada Dr Howard Glazer, Cariology, USA Prof. Dr I. Krejci, Conservative Dentistry, Switzerland Dr Edward Lynch, Restorative, Ireland Dr Ziv Mazor, Implantology, Israel Prof. Dr Georg Meyer, Restorative, Germany Prof. Dr Rudolph Slavicek, Function, Austria Dr Marius Steigmann, Implantology, Germany © 2013, DENTAL TRIBUNE INTERNATIONAL GMBH. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Dental Tribune makes every effort to report clinical information and manufacturer’s product news accurately, but cannot assume responsibility for the validity of product claims, or for typographical errors. The publishers also do not assume responsibility for product names or claims, or statements made by advertisers. Opinions expressed by authors are their own and may not reflect those of Dental Tribune International. DENTAL TRIBUNE INTERNATIONAL Holbeinstr. 29, 04229 Leipzig, Germany Tel.: +49 341 4 84 74 302 | Fax: +49 341 4 84 74 173 www.dental-tribune.com info@dental-tribune.com DENTAL TRIBUNE SOUTH AFRICA Modern Dentistry Media PO Box 76021 Wendywood 2144 South Africa Tel: +27 11 702 3195 | Fax: +27 86-568-1116 www.moderndentistrymedia.com PUBLISHER Ursula Jenkins ursula@moderndentistrymedia.com BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT Chris Jenkins chris@moderndentistrymedia.com ADMINISTRATION Jane Wilson DESIGN & LAYOUT C Designz LICENSING BY DENTAL TRIBUNE INTERNATIONAL this partnership as “a strategic partner coming into this business, we felt we could add value at a strategic level and give back office support in the country”. Litha wants to see what they could add to the dental business and perhaps bring in some of their own products to the dental trade. Company Information The Dental Warehouse is one of South Africa’s biggest importers and distributers of dental products and has been in operation for over 40 years. The company currently employs over 60 staff and has offices in Cape Town, Durban, Pretoria and Springs with its HQ in Johannesburg. The Dental Warehouse is a family run business by Louis and Bernice Ichikowitz whose family also own and run other leading businesses. The company places a high emphasis on family and as such its staff members are treated as family with some having worked at the company for over 30 years. Mr Ichikowitz stated, “Our family has always worked on the basis of team… working on the basis that we work together to get mutual satisfaction and enjoyment out of every day. That is the way we have built up The Dental Warehouse.” Henry Schein is the largest provider of healthcare products to dental, medical and animal health practitioners with 75 years of experience and is a Fortune 500 Company and a member of the NASDAQ 100 Index. With operations in 25 countries (including South Africa) over 16 000 employees serve upwards of 775 000 clients. Henry Schein has a product listing of over 200 000 different products of which there are 51 000 dental SKUs (Stock Keeping Units). The dental aspect of the business makes up 53.4% of total net sales. Litha Healthcare Group consists of over 475 employees and is listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. The company is a diversified healthcare group that products both products and services to all aspects of the healthcare field; from hospitals to pharmacies to government healthcare programmes. There are three distinct divisions of Litha which include: Litha Pharma, Litha Medical and Litha Biotech. DT