About Frank Barlin

Frank is the founder and managing partner at Sibaya. He provides recognized leadership in homecare consulting and has advised firms ranging in size from those listed on the NYSE and the LSE to early stage startups. Frank’s international experience is broad-based, having spent his professional life based in Europe, the United States and South Africa. Prior to founding Sibaya in 2002 he was European Vice President for a publicly traded healthcare company. In addition he has held various country general management positions and directorships. Recent home healthcare projects include European business development, acquisition strategy and advice, competitive benchmarking, Asian outsourcing and turnaround management. He works out of the Paris office.

Author Archive | Frank Barlin

To all Homecare CEO’s – What RONA and IRR Don’t Tell You In Outsourcing Decisions

Don’t forget to include the following in your next calculation: The cost of the knowledge that is being lost, possibly forever. The cost of being unable to innovate in future, because critical knowledge has been lost. The consequent cost of its current business being destroyed by competitors emerging who can make a better product at [...]

Read full story Comments { 0 }

It’s November 14 And It’s World Diabetes Day

Frederick Banting and Charles Best, were instrumental in the discovery of insulin in 1922, and have saved millions of lives since then. So while there is cause to celebrate there is also the realization that there is no cure for this life altering disease which often attacks the young with type 1 and catches others [...]

Read full story Comments { 0 }

The Emerging Private Homecare Market – People Pay For Design

Healthcare is often a forced lifestyle choice – if that makes sense. Patients often have a choice on what level of healthcare and certainly what healthcare products they they use. Of course some people unfortunately have none. If however you do have a choice then the choices are getting better as manufacturers start to produce [...]

Read full story Comments { 0 }

Who Said It Can’t Be Done – Vilgo French Homecare Company Grows With 100% France Production

Despite the rush to Asian outsourcing trend and the “stereotype” of expensive French manufacturing, HMS-Vilgo a French based manufacturer makes “100% made in France” medical / homecare beds. Not only that, CEO Patrick Jude has grown the business from about 1000 beds to 24000 beds per year from 1997 and remarks that they have used [...]

Read full story Comments { 0 }

Sign Of The Times In The Homecare Industry (Gentle Downsizing)

In this latest news, Invacare has released 50 employees, most from their Elyria headquarters. They are not the only company in the homecare / mobility industry to do so recently. Invacare maintains that dismissed staff are “office workers” and spokesperson Lara Mahoney is quoted as saying that they are “just ensuring that we’re running as [...]

Read full story Comments { 0 }

China v USA

Update – The US Senate passes the bill. If it does not happen now, then it is just a question of time? China has threatened the US with a trade war if the US law-makers pass a bill currently under discussion that will force the value of the Chinese RMB to rise against the US [...]

Read full story Comments { 1 }

Invacare Q2 2011 Results And The Outlook

Invacare announced their Q2 2011 results yesterday and the stock dropped in the region of 5%, why? What didn’t the market like, especially in view of the fact that: Organic net sales growth was up 3.8% vs Q2 last year. Adjusted EPS improved 15% vs Q2 last year to $0.45. Invacare generated free cash flow of $21.3 [...]

Read full story Comments { 0 }

Automatic Gears For Manual Wheelchair – A Breakthrough…

A manual wheelchair system that automatically senses current usage and shifts gears automatically has been developed. Use on any wheelchair. Enter Scott Daigle, together with the team at IntelliWheels, has developed a product that automatically shifts gears according to speed and force, allowing the driver, for example to climb slopes easier, without changing gears manually. [...]

Read full story Comments { 0 }