Intuitive Surgical price target raised to $385 from $335 at Evercore ISI

Evercore ISI analyst Vijay Kumar raised the firm’s price target on Intuitive Surgical (ISRG) to $385 from $335 and keeps an In Line rating on the shares. The highlight on the earnings call was Intuitive announcing that it had submitted its da Vinci 5 510K in August 2023 and had asked for a broad indication approval. Typically, a 510k approval process timeline is around 6-9 months, which makes a potential approval by mid-April likely and with shares trading around $390 per share in after-hours, “it raises some interesting questions from a financial standpoint,” the analyst tells investors. Manufacturing capacity constraints will play a role, and if customers do pause as they await a new system, there is a potential for near-term disruption, says Evercore, which adds that “there will be competitive noise,” both on the private and public side from the likes of Moon Surgical, Medtronic (MDT) and Johnson & Johnson (JNJ).