INTERVIEW Roger Gooden - Medical Buying Group
“Even though times are difficult, if you’re focused and driven, you can still achieve what you want to.”
Transformation, trust and
transparency
Comms Business caught up with Roger Gooden, founding partner and CEO of the Medical Buying Group, to find
out more about the new company
Roger Gooden and
Jonathan Rutter
launched the Medical
Buying Group (MBG)
in August to challenge the
status quo when it comes to
medical procurement. e two
co-founders met at the iFace
Group, where they delivered
telecoms and IT services for
numerous healthcare clients.
From speaking to those clients,
it was clear to Gooden and
Rutter that GP surgeries and
healthcare professionals could
benet from improved supply
procurement processes. ey set
out to form MBG.
Early this year, they
appointed Anthony Davy,
former vice president of
Genpact, as managing director.
en, the three outlined a
mission to use technology to
deliver an enhanced customer
experience, with a focus on
core values of transformation,
transparency, and trust.
Davy’s corporate background
Roger Gooden
has allowed MBG to ensure the
business is scalable from the
start. Gooden explained, “We
realised we need to have people
in the business that know how
to develop the process and drive
to scale the business. Anthony
is all about the attention to
detail and his focus is on the
member experience.”
It is still early days for the
new company but, since its
launch, Gooden said the
feedback has been positive so
far. He added, “e Channel
has been looking for something
to revitalise the industry and
their revenue streams. e
partners that we are talking to
are quite happy to be working
with us, on the basis they can
see where they can rebuild
revenue that has potentially
dropped, especially due to the
likes of Covid. ey can see
how they will potentially be
able to bring themselves back
up to the revenue and earnings
in the channel of circa 2005.”
Amazon for medical supplies
MBG has a broad aim to
simplify healthcare supply
procurement processes, so we
asked what an ideal medical
supply provider looks like.
Gooden explained the company
and its partners ensure
healthcare organisations can
get everything they require
from one place. He added, “We
call it the Amazon feel, where
customers go on the portal,
click on what they need, things
are delivered on time and things
are generally always in stock.
Because of the constraints
in the health industry at the
moment, we’re trying to make
things easy for GP practices so
they can streamline their order
process.”
Given the tech backgrounds
of MBG’s management team,
we asked what the telco and
IT channel does well in terms
of procurement processes that
make it transferable to broader
healthcare services. Gooden
explained that IT and telecoms
professionals have always taken
the time to understand exactly
what the customer requirements
are. Services are then developed
and delivered to meet those
needs. is service-centric
approach, built on customer
understanding, is well suited to
the medical industry.
We came back to
the company values of
transformation, transparency,
and trust. Gooden explained
how these have guided the
MBG management team. He
said, “We put our customers
at the centre of everything we
do; we like to say we are sitting
on the same side of the table as
them because we are. We work
hard to build partnerships with
our members, we are honest
about our operations, our
suppliers, our pricing. We are
constantly adapting to feedback
and improving to make their
experience even better. And
we’re really listening to what the
requirements of the healthcare
industry are.”
Gearing up for growth
Now MBG has built the right
foundations, Gooden and his
team will focus on making “a
clear dent in this industry”. To
Roger Gooden, founding
partner and CEO of the
Medical Buying Group
make that happen, the company
will continue to recruit partners
as well as providing a good
experience for members that
are already regularly using the
MBG portal.
is industry has a lot
of potential for partners
examining new revenue
streams, and feedback from
healthcare clients has shown
medical procurement processes
could learn a lot from the
telecoms and IT industry.
Gooden said, “Even though
times are dicult in many
industries at the moment,
if you’re really focused and
driven, you can still achieve
what you want to and adapt to
these new ways of working. It’s
all about helping each other
right now.”
Gooden with Medical Buying
Group co-founder, Jonathan Rutter
28 | Comms Business Magazine | October 2020 www.commsbusiness.co.uk
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