The Group Dentistry Now Show: The Voice of the DSO Industry

Ranked the #1 DSO Podcast!

Welcome to The Group Dentistry Now Show: The Voice of the DSO Industry!

We dive deep into the world of emerging technologies in the DSO space while focusing on the latest advancements in AI and how they can transform dental practices. We also look at creative financing and at how operating leases could be the solution for your DSO.

Join us as we welcome three industry experts:

Barry Trexler, President and CEO of Tua Financial
Samantha Strain, Founding Partner & Chief Development Officer of Healthstream Ventures
Conor O’Brien, Vice President of Sales of CCA Financial

In this episode, we cover:

The latest technologies reshaping the dental landscape, including AI, 3D printing, and integrated cloud ecosystems.
The financial implications of adopting new technologies and how to finance them effectively.
The advantages of operating leases and how they can preserve cash flow while allowing for rapid technology deployment.

To learn more about financing your technology visit – https://tuafinancial.com/dental/

Email Contacts:

Barry Trexler: [email protected]
Samantha Strain: [email protected]
Conor O’Brien: https://www.linkedin.com/in/conor-o/

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Technology Financing DSO podcast transcript:

Welcome to the Group Dentistry Now Show, the voice of the DSO industry. Join us as we talk with industry leaders about their challenges, successes, and the future of group dentistry. With over 200 episodes and listeners in over 100 countries, we’re proud to be ranked the number one DSO podcast. For the latest DSO news, analysis, and events, and to subscribe to our DSO Weekly e-newsletter, visit GroupDentistryNow.com. We hope you enjoyed today’s show.

Bill Neumann: Welcome, everyone, to the Group Dentistry Now show. I’m Bill Neumann, and as always, we appreciate you tuning in. We are going to focus on, I think, something that everybody talks about in the industry, but it’s pretty confusing. And I think it’s about time that we actually really go through What type of technologies are available in the DSO space right now? We say technology or we say AI, it seems to cover everything. So we’re going to do a deep dive into emerging technology, AI solutions, what DSOs and emerging groups in particular should be focused on. And we’ve got three. And then, of course, not just the technology, but how do you pay for it? How do you finance it? Because there might be some great options out there, some great solutions. The ROI might be wonderful, but how the heck do you pay for everything? So we’re going to cover that in great detail here. So we’ve got three guests with us today. We have Barry Trexler, who is the president and CEO of Tua Financial. Barry, thanks for being on. It’s great to see you. Good to see you. I’ve known Barry for quite a long time. I saw Barry just recently at the Dykema meeting. We also have Samantha Strange. She is the founding partner and chief development officer of Healthstream Ventures and also the co-founder of DoubleMint Ventures. Sam, great to have you here. Thanks, Bill. Great to be here. And I’ve also known Sam for quite a while. She’s been in the industry for a little bit. And Conor O’Brien, who is the Vice President of Sales for CCA Financial. Hi, Conor. How are you?

Conor O’Brien: Doing well. How are you? Thanks for having me.

Bill Neumann: Yeah, it’s great. Why don’t we do this? Why doesn’t everybody give the audience a little bit of your background and then also a little bit about the companies that you represent? And Barry, why don’t we start with you?

Barry Trexler: Sure. So Barry Trexler, President and CEO of Tua Financial. We’re a fintech based out of Las Vegas. We’re multinational as well. So Calgary, Canada. And I’ve been in the dental industry for a long time through Care Credit, Chase Health Advance, and probably most recently, Outsider to a Financial with Demat Holdings and enjoy this industry so much. So just real quick about to a financial. We’re a fintech that is focused on bringing financial solutions to the practices. So today we have a consumer finance patient financing solution called TuaPay. We’re also reimagining access to capital. So we stood up a commercial financing business that we’ll talk about called TuaCommercial. So thank you, Bill, again for having me.

Bill Neumann: Thanks, Barry. Samantha Strain, how about a little bit about your background? And Samantha, did I meet you initially when you were, was it American Dental Partners?

Samantha Strain: That is when we met the first time. Yes, I was there for about five years and we sold to Heartland Dental. in early 2021. And since then, I have built and helped found Healthstream Ventures. And we’ve become an investment bank focused on the lower middle market. And I also have another company called DoubleMint Ventures, but really my work sits at the intersection of dental and healthcare investment banking. And we’re primarily specializing in DSOs, private equity, entrepreneurial dentists, building doctor-led groups. At Healthstream, I help clients secure capital, form and expand investment-grade groups, and execute on successful transactions if that’s what they want to do. And then through DoubleMint Ventures, I’ve partnered with innovative brands alongside my partner, Dr. Carolyn Brown. Brands like Overjet, Vivardis, Anatomy Financial, Go-To-Market Strategies, and Growth Execution. I’ve been in the space for about 20 years. And I’ve just been fortunate enough to help drive growth for some of the most visionary, I think, products that are out there now. and some of these emerging dental-led or doctor-led dental groups that are out there. And so, fun fact about me, I’m a former junior Olympic swimmer. If you’ve ever met me, I’m about six foot tall, but I try to carry that, you know, relentless energy with me through these creative deal-making endeavors we go through and help really shape and build award-winning teams. And so, I’m excited to be a part of this conversation today.

Bill Neumann: Very cool. That is a fun fact. I did not know that. So, that’s awesome.

Samantha Strain: Not many people do. I don’t really talk about it that much. But I thought I’d share today.

Bill Neumann: That’s great. Conor, how about a little bit about your background and your organization?

Conor O’Brien: Yeah, great. I’m Conor O’Brien, Vice President of Sales based in the Boston, Massachusetts area. I’ve been in the equipment financing industry for 15 years, started on the bank side. I’ve been at CCA now for five years. And CCA, we’re based out of Richmond. We were started in 1972. coming up on 54 years in business as a self-funded independent lessor. That’s just really unique in the marketplace in terms of we don’t use bank capital to fund our transactions. And we’re funding anything from obviously dental equipment to other clinical assets, IT equipment. It’s really where we grew up in the industry funding IT equipment. So robotics, materials handling, all types of collateral. But what really makes us unique is our funding structure. Essentially a family office. That gives us the ability to fund the DSOs, private equity backed practices, but also all the way up to investment grade enterprise business for big dollar amounts. So great firm, great group, really understand the industry and where it’s going and here to support.

Bill Neumann: Thank you, Conor. So let’s get into this discussion here. We started things off talking about all the technology that’s out there, that’s available, that’s changing pretty quickly, as quickly as we can determine what we want to explore or use in a group. It seems to, there’s an update or an upgrade, or there’s something new. But there are a lot of opportunities there, too. And I think with some of the challenges that DSOs have now, you can leverage technology to really help, whether it’s challenges with human capital, there are AI solutions that can help with that. I think with some of the younger clinicians that tend to work at DSOs and group practices, there are some solutions out there that make dentistry easier, provided you learn how to use them correctly. But why don’t we start with you, Samantha, maybe talk a little bit about some of these emerging technologies that are coming into the DSO space. You mentioned a couple of them. You actually work with some of the companies out there that bring these technologies to the industry. But talk about that. And then I guess, you know, we’re really going to talk about, you know, also, what are some of the costs? What’s the ROI? So maybe the ins and outs of some of these technologies that are available.

Samantha Strain: Sure, I’ll do the best I can, you know, at the moment, the the pace of innovation is unlike anything we’ve ever seen, you know, AI is really, you know, reshaping the dental landscape, both not only on the clinical side, but both on on also on the, you know, the business fronts. And I think that you know, the technology pipeline, as you probably, if any of our listeners went to Dykema, it is accelerating. It’s not slowing down. So for DSOs, especially those emerging doctor-led groups, you know, the question isn’t, you know, if to adopt the new technology, but it’s, you know, how fast, how smart you can deploy it to drive top line and bottom line growth. So, you know, some of the things that we’re real keen on as far as emerging tech and CapEx advancements that we feel are really driving DSO growth are really around the AI and data driven platforms, you know, things that allow earlier, more accurate diagnosis, you know, higher case acceptance, treatment revenues, automated claims, you know, we have pre authorizations now and scheduling faster collections, reduced admin times there. their standardization of workflows, consistent quality across locations is boosting enterprise value. And that’s been interesting to see. Also, 3D printing, digital impressions, CAD CAM, That’s been here in the industry for a while now, but just the same store, same day restorations, reduced lab costs, faster chair turnover, improved patient experience, right? I think that increases a lot of referrals and retention of patient base. There’s also a lot of advancements around imaging and robotics, reduced procedural times, more billable procedures per day, market differentiators. I think that attracts providers and both providers and patients, right, to the practices. And then, of course, just to touch on a couple more that I think are just interesting categories are, you know, the integrated cloud ecosystems that are out there. We have unified PMS, imaging, analytics, you know, real-time operational insights there. Easier post-acquisition integration scalability across, you know, delivering smoother M&A transactions. That’s something that we talk a lot about in my world. Integrations is something that I think we can’t spend enough time on in this space, really. And I don’t think that we’re doing a good enough job as a market, you know, identifying integrations to have more successful, you know, M&A transactions post-close. But that’s a whole nother show. But revenue cycle and automation is really, I think, the last one that I’ll touch on with, you know, lower lab costs and fewer denials. you know, obviously that that means stronger EBITDA margins. It frees up staff for patient engagement and growth activities. So, you know, as far as investment, into those spaces and the impact that that has, you know, scalability and standardization, higher valuation multiples across the board for integration-ready groups. Margins, I think, for expansion are more defensible. Technology, CapEx equipment, they all improve those efficiencies. And, you know, they’re hard to, you know, It’s technology that improves efficiencies and are hard to replicate, get premium valuations, right, and capital efficiencies. So modernization of heavy leverage improves balance sheet strength and acquisitions. And that’s why I’m excited about, you know, the things that Tua is doing. And creation of an off-balance sheet lease, operating lease for these groups, I think it’s going to make a huge impact on scalability and being able to afford and finance these technologies into the ecosystem of the DSO. And so I’ll turn this over to Barry and team to talk more about what they’re doing and how they’re doing that. But, you know, I think there’s great strength here to really on the tangible and intangible value drivers on how to make this work for a DSO and how they can incorporate more things and scale faster by being able to lease instead of having to, you know, purchase. plot out. So Barry, I’m sorry to talk so much, but I hope I laid some groundwork there.

Bill Neumann: Yeah, that’s great, Samantha. I mean, I think you really have. Before we let Barry jump in with how do you pay for all of this, Maybe some of those categories, can we talk a little bit about some maybe average costs? Like we talk about like CBCT, I mean, 100 to 150,000, right? I think we look at robotics, gosh, I don’t even know what it would cost for that. But I know that that probably is maybe north of that 150K range. Do you have any idea on some costs in some of these categories? Some of them are less expensive, like the lasers and the printing and things like that.

Samantha Strain: Well, you know, when you’re talking about platform wide, you know, and you have a CBCT that’s 150,000 and you have to deploy 30 of those across your platform, that gets pretty costly, right? And really anything at scale that you’re having to finance becomes a costly, you know, point for these groups. And so I’ve seen a lot of the DSOs that are in market now, you know, really struggle with where and when to deploy the CapEx that they really need just because they can’t, They can’t make the investment on the front end to do it. And so what we try to do early on is before we’re acquiring a platform for some of our buyers on the PE side, we take a deep dive look into where the CapEx spend is now and where it’s going. And those can be into the millions of dollar range, right? For a lot of these larger groups. So it definitely does make an impact.

Bill Neumann: Yeah, absolutely. That’s, that’s a really good point. And the one thing that I’ll just add, and then Barry, I’d love to get your feedback on this. I think one of the things that DSOs don’t necessarily think about, but it’s important for the clinicians and even office staff is they want to work. for organizations that are investing back into the practices with technology and the younger dentists coming out of dental school. It’s a pretty competitive market. There are a lot of DSO options out there. And if I’m a young clinician, I’d want to work for the one that has the coolest toys. So I think there’s something to be said for that. And then on a retention side of things as well. Go ahead, Barry.

Barry Trexler: Well, I agree with you, Bill. And I think that at the center of all this is the patient. So how are the DSOs advancing care for their patient? Because today, those patients who are consumers, they have access to a lot of information. And we know that, right? We look at our phones every day and we get bombarded by new information, and so they generally know what’s happening in a lot of industries, especially industries where we think of it here at TUA as essential services such as healthcare. And so they know that some of the new technology that’s coming into the space, they certainly know that AI is pervasive in almost every daily activity as a consumer that they engage in. So it definitely is, and I think our core audience, the emerging DSO for TUA commercial, they know this, and they’re focused on that patient care, and that’s paramount. So the investment in these new technologies is certainly you have to do it. So just a little bit of background on why we stood up to a commercial and engage partners such as Conors that when we’re basically, we started as a consumer financing platform and we were a little different than those that are out there. We’re embedded in some of the major card processing platforms out there, in particular Global Payments, which that gives us access to other platforms and dental such as Curb Dental, Planet DDS, Eaglesoft. So sitting as I came into this business, sitting in knowing the dental space very well, very engaged in it, whether I’m doing finance or selling dental products, You know, being in tune with what’s going on in the industry, what I looked at was, okay, a practice certainly needs consumer financing, but how can I be a better partner to the industry? How can I, how can Tua Financial be a better partner to the industry? So looking at, you’ve got this two converging or maybe multiple converging lines going on. One, this influx of incredible advancement in technology, but also you have this interesting environment in the financial space, high interest rates. Some of the banks out there, if a practice is doing business with a small bank up to a regional bank, they are, I’ll tell you today, they’re focused on deposits. So they’re not lending as much as they did. So the point being access to capital is paramount. So we see to a financial as an opportunity to provide that access to capital. So we’re addressing that convergence of A lot of need for advancing technology in the practice and making sure that as a practice owner or enterprise that I have access to capital. So that’s the reason why we have stood up to a commercial and bringing products like certainly term loans, but unique products, working capital. and an operating lease to market. And by the way, the operating lease that Samantha referred to, and Conor is going to give us some in-depth discussion about that. The reason why that came about, and we partnered with CCA Financial on that opportunity, is exactly this. There’s a need to bring that technology to bear in the practice quickly, efficiently. And, you know, sometimes the banks or even if you have access to a good bank, the, excuse me, the little tech hiccup there. But even if you have access to the bank, the timelines of getting a loan, especially if it may be an SBA loan, they’re very long. So we’ve stood up a process where instead of a two to four week process, we can get funding to a practice for technology within as little as 48 hours. And so that allows them to bring that technology into practice and bring it to use and start advancing their patient care. So on the operating lease side, what we heard was DSOs have a need for an operating lease versus a finance lease. So the ability to, as Samantha said, take that that funding for the technology off balance sheet and move it to the expense line. And it also allows for some other opportunities where the DSO does not have to think about, at the end of the life of that equipment, what to do with it. Do they continue to use it? Do they sell it? Or do they just put it out in the pasture, so to speak? So an operating lease can bring a new opportunity to essentially Apple eyes, if you will, the opportunity to bring you refresh tech every three years. And so we found a great partner, CCA financial, who has been doing this for years. They’re experts at it. And we think this is a great opportunity specifically for emerging DSOs to bring new technology, be able to refresh it. And one last thing is this also allows the DSO to match expense to revenue. I mean, one-to-one since it sits on the expense line. So that’s what we’re doing. We’ve set up this partnership with CCA. financial to deliver this product to market. And we think it’s a great way for, especially for emerging DSOs to get access to that technology quickly and efficiently and put it into patient care.

Bill Neumann: Thanks, Barry. That’s, seems pretty unique in the space. I don’t think we’ve, I think this is new to the industry. And I’m really happy that we’re talking about this. And I think it’s, Conor, maybe you could do a deeper dive on, you know, what an operating lease is compared to maybe what the industry is used to. And you’re really, CCA is powering this for Tua, right? I mean, you’re kind of the engine behind this operating lease.

Conor O’Brien: It froze up for a second there, but I think I knew where you were going. Can you guys hear me? Yes. Yes. So Barry teed it up great. What we do, we’re not a bank. So from a deposit standpoint, to Barry’s point, we don’t look at that. We are simply funding equipment related initiatives within an organization. That’s in the dental industry, but every other vertical out there. And that’s all we do. So we structure typically anywhere from, you know, on the shorter term would be a 12-month rental, think like mobility devices, up to maybe a 60-month or 72-month term for some, you know, forklifts or longer-term assets. But that’s all we do. That’s all we’ve ever done. We’re very, very good at it. We understand, you know, all the types of collateral that Samantha had highlighted in terms of 3D printing, the clinical assets. But really, and Bill made a great point in terms of the practice itself, in terms of acquiring new talent and patient experience, everything in the four walls, whether it’s FF&E, furniture, AV, digital display, point of sale, everything, we understand all the different types of collateral that are going into a DSO, into a practice. So that’s what we do. We understand all the assets and how to price them and why customers choose to leverage an equipment finance and equipment leases. One, preserve cash. That goes without saying, they don’t want to outlay the capital. Like Samantha had mentioned, across 30 locations for one asset, it could be in the millions of the dollars, if it’s a robotics asset or another asset. So the dollar amount can get up there and they want to not outlay the capital. They want to preserve cash and flatten out the spend. Two, and again, a lot of the assets that Samantha highlighted, they’re emerging tech. The customers that leverage equipment lease financing want to hedge against the obsolescence that’s inherent in these clinical assets, robotics especially, but IT. A lot of companies don’t have laptops, for example, the past four years because the maintenance costs go up and the equipment breaks down and they want to stay on a hardware as a service refresh cycle. So that’s our product. That’s the benefits. The key benefits of what we provide is flattening out the spend, preserving cash, hedging against obsolescence, and having that backend flexibility to, at the end of the term, the assets may be ready for a refresh. If so, great. You’re going to have a flattened spend to get new gear, but kind of pay the same monthly amount. Or Or they can say, you know, this asset’s working for us. Let’s keep it in place. Let’s keep it for another year or two. We work with them behind the scenes because we’re not a bank and we don’t phone with banks. We hold title to everything and don’t sell off any of our papers. So we can do an extension. We can do a rework midterm. And on the back end, we can provide buyout options or extension options for some of the assets or all the assets. So I think the key thing and why we are a leader in the industry is how we’re funded and our independence allows us to provide our end users a ton of flexibility, tons of optionality. And I think most importantly for the entire market, our credit box is probably the widest in the industry and our ability to fund both upstream with investment grade enterprise level customers, all the way down to, in some cases, private practices, true SMB business. So I’ll stop there.

Bill Neumann: Thanks, Conor. I’d love to get maybe an example of like, do you have a concrete example of what an operating lease would look like? Like the dollar amount, what would be that lease focused on? How do you typically do that? Is it per organization or is it focused on a specific technology? How does that work?

Conor O’Brien: Great question. It could be project focused. So customer knows they want to get maybe a certain clinical asset and it’s a $500,000 asset across their locations. And so we work that individual project with that particular vendor. Most of our structures are 36 or 48 month terms. We take a look at what is the equipment’s residual value going to be at the end of that term. And then we take a residual position in that equipment. And essentially, it’s a lease. If it’s a high quality credit and good equipment, that rate is going to be a lot lower than a traditional loan model. Right now rates are 6% roughly. We’re going to take a residual investment and buy down that rate. It might be low single digits, it might be zero, it might be negative depending on the term, the asset and the credit profile. Project specific vendor, you know, we have a lot of vendor programs. We’ll work with the vendor. They have that project. They provide us the asset. We look at the collateral credit in term. Those are kind of the three legs that we look at to price a deal and then put that pricing in front of the end user. And then there’s, you know, there’s obviously back and forth in terms of actually we think we want a 48 month instead of a 36 or we want a 24 month or, you know, they want a certain structure for their business needs. But that’s vendor specific project financing for leases. We look at those three legs and then price a deal. The other way we do it is kind of a facility approach where we’re having high-level conversations with the CFO or procurement or IT at a DSL or enterprise business. And they say, listen, here are our equipment needs from a clinical standpoint, from FF&E, from IT for the rest of 2025 going into 2026. And in those instances, we look at the credit again, and we’ll stand up these facilities for them to basically offload all their equipment Whether if it was historically capital purchases or they were going through a bank, they are now folding their equipment needs under a lease facility through CCA. So in those instances, we might have a couple different terms for different assets. So for their mobility assets, they might be shorter terms, 24-month terms. For the clinical assets, it might be a 36-month term. And then for their laptops, they want to be in a four-year refresh cycle for their laptops. So we’ll have different rate factors, different terms under that facility. And then we’re basically just paying the invoices to their vendors on their behalf. And then those leases would commence monthly based upon when the equipment’s delivered. And we start billing the end user monthly based upon when that equipment’s delivered. But that’s more of the umbrella facility approach to handle all the DSOs or enterprises equipment needs under that broader facility.

Samantha Strain: And Bill, if I can jump in here, I think the most important thing from my standpoint, obviously I’m working with a lot of these emerging groups, is that it preserves the borrowing capacity. Operating leases keep the liability off the balance sheet. In many cases, leaving the debt to equity ratio tons cleaner than it would be. And this preserves the ability to tap traditional credit lines for higher ROI activities like acquisitions and de novos that the group may want to do. So this is like a critical, I think, gap in the market that Tua and Conor’s group are facilitating for us. You know, most groups are growing through acquisitions or de novos. I mean, there’s same store growth, and obviously that’s been a buzzword. But, you know, same store growth also takes capital to grow as well, right?

Bill Neumann: Yeah, absolutely. Samantha, is this, I mean, is this something that you’ve, I mean, you consult with a lot of groups out there. So this sounds very appealing, especially given, you know, the economic environment we’re in with high interest rates. I think this becomes even more and more appealing.

Samantha Strain: A thousand times it’s going to be once this hits the market and people really start understanding what this means for their DSO, no matter your size, you know, you could be a two to three to five location group and this operating lease will work for you. Or you can be a hundred, 200 location group and this operating lease will work for you. not only will allow you to accelerate CapEx deployment, but you’re going to, like Barry said, it matches your expenses to the revenue, which I think is from structural payments. Operating leases, the structure payments are predictable, right? So having that lens on recurring expenses and aligning those with cash flow, that the new equipment actually generates is huge. Instead of that heavy upfront CapEx or fixed debt repayment costs, the cost tracks with the revenue impact and it’s smoothing the P&L. And this is probably creating less heartburn, right? When you can predict and you can run alongside your technology advancement alongside your P&L. I mean, this is, in my opinion, it’s going to be a golden nugget, which is why I’m excited. And, you know, because part of the reason why, you know, we are going to deploy this solution into a lot of the groups that we’re working with are for these reasons. that, you know, we’ve just talked about before. I mean, and obviously avoiding the capital constraints because of the tighter credit market, the cost of capital, as we all know, has increased and access to larger loans are more restrictive. And so lenders are, they’re requiring stronger covenants, more documentation, higher interest rates, making debt funded equipment upgrades less attractive. And this leasing, the operational leases, they sidestep these constraints and keep growth momentum intact. So couldn’t be more excited about this.

Barry Trexler: Yeah. And Bill, if I may add, let me just tell you where the genesis of this came from. It was a major manufacturer who came to us and as we have been going to market as to a commercial. And at that time, early in the year, we’re offering, you know, term loans, working capital. And the question was, hey, do you have an operating lease? And the reason for it is exactly everything Samantha went through. that this allows an especially emergent DSO to get the tech they need. They can expense the monthly expense on the operating lease versus depreciation and interest. They can get the tech quickly. And we’ve worked with CCA now on several mini-deals at this point, and it’s been a fast, efficient service. It’s been tremendous. So that was the genesis of it. We had a major dental manufacturer come to us and ask us, do we have this product? And we partnered with CCA to bring it to The other thing that we like about this program is that the soft costs related to installation and training can also be financed within the lease. I don’t know if that was covered as Conor was speaking, but that’s extremely attractive. Again, taking the angst out of the decision about how to finance the technology and as well as can the lease be structured in such a way to address installation warranties, etc.

Bill Neumann: Well, just having a couple of conversations at Dykema, which just recently happened, and actually having a lunch with a CFO of a relatively large DSO recently. I mean, this is something that is very appealing. And there are a lot of concerns with the CFOs, CEOs, COOs, the ones out, the procurement people that have the clinicians coming to them. requesting technology. They’re definitely really looking at what their costs are and really trying to manage them the best way they can. And I do think this is a great opportunity. Barry, what’s the feedback that you’ve had as you bring this to market? Because again, it’s a relatively new concept to the dental industry.

Barry Trexler: It’s been received extremely well. And like I said, we’re working with a major manufacturer today. And we’re financing equipment, not only DSOs, but also institutions, so schools as well. So very well received. And again, the partnership with CCA has been extremely beneficial because It’s been fast, efficient. They know this process very well. Getting the proposal to the customer, we help with that. Getting the PO to the supplier, manufacturer, and then getting the deal done. manufacturer, supplier gets paid, and the enterprise gets the equipment quickly and efficiently and gets to use it in a much more shorter time period than if they went to capitalize it in a financial loan structure.

Bill Neumann: That’s great. As we wrap this podcast up here, I’d just like to get final thoughts from everybody, and then I’ll make sure that we get everybody’s email addresses and LinkedIn information. I’ll put those in the show notes. But just, Samantha, why don’t we start with you, some final thoughts.

Samantha Strain: Yeah, you know, I think operating leases are a strategic financing tool in today’s environment where speed and capital efficiency and flexibility are more valuable than ownership, right, of the actual piece of equipment. They allow the DSO or the emerging group to modernize across multiple locations simultaneously without over leveraging while matching the cost directly to the revenue of the equipment it generates. And that in a market where the cost of capital is rising and loan times are lengthening. And prior to my time heading up development at American Dental Partners, I worked at Bank of America. we’re seeing new host. And this approach, you know, with the operating lease gives DSOs the agility to grow faster, protect their balance sheet and stay, you know, technologically competitive and, you know, in a competitive marketplace that speed to adoption of new tech, it’s a real differentiator for both patient acquisition and like we all mentioned before, you know, provider recruitment. So those are my closing remarks, and happy to be a part of this conversation today. Thanks for having me.

Bill Neumann: Yeah, thank you, Samantha. We’ll drop your LinkedIn handle in the show notes. What’s an email address for you if anybody wants to reach out to you?

Samantha Strain: Sure, you can email me at ss, so samsam at hsv, as in victorllc.com.

Bill Neumann: Okay, and we’ll put that in the show notes as well. Conor, final thoughts from you?

Conor O’Brien: Yeah, I’m excited. Been excited since Barry and I started talking about launching this several months ago. I think what we’ve seen is a void in the marketplace from a macro credit standpoint and from the banking side. And then you factor in the emerging tech and customers wanting to get current and experience the ROI associated with this technology. well-positioned to help as a non-bank source. So I’m really excited. I think it was a great conversation. And yeah, that’s all I got for closing remarks.

Bill Neumann: Thanks, Conor. And what about your email address? I know pretty much everything’s going to go through Tua, but just in case. How about this? I know you’re on LinkedIn because I just linked in with you today. Yeah, I think it was this morning. So he’s there. I’ll drop your LinkedIn handle in the show notes. And then Barry, we want to make sure that people reach out to Tua. And then also we’ll put your LinkedIn information. We’ll put in your email address if you want to shout that out. But final thoughts. And I know you also have something called a business health assessment that you want to offer listeners and watchers of this podcast. So viewers of this podcast, maybe talk a little bit about, you know, final thoughts and then what this business health assessment is.

Barry Trexler: Okay, sure. Thanks, Bill. So, my final thoughts are that the operating lease, which we’re focused on today, just offers, we’ve covered it, but it offers simplicity, full deductibility of the lease payments. So, it provides that great flexibility and there’s a predictable tax treatment as well. So, from a FinOp standpoint, it makes their life fairly simple from our point of view. It brings that patient, it advances the patient care, which we will bring it back to the front end of the conversation, the focus on the patient for that emergent DSO to advance the patient care quickly. And also, if you think about it, we haven’t talked about, we talked a little bit about it, but the dental staff, having confidence that the organization that they’re working for is bringing that new technology to bear so that they can advance the care of the patient. So those are my final remarks. Super happy to partner with C-SAFE. financial and Sam and her organization on multiple levels. And yes, so TUA Commercial is offering a business assessment. It’s free. And really what we’re doing, it’s a few questions that we’re asking at the practice and DSO wants to participate. where they can understand how they compare across their cohorts. We’ve done this, we’ve been doing this in market for about two months now, very well received. And we give them some action plans. And of course, they’ll hear about the operating lease and the advantages of having an operating lease. But at the end of the day, it’s a service that we’re providing as just being a partner to the industry.

Bill Neumann: And Barry, if somebody wants to get in touch with you, I know the website is tuafinancial.com. Again, we can drop that in the show notes. And on the commercial side, there actually is a little dropdown for commercial. If somebody wants to do the business assessment, we can add that link in the show notes as well. But somebody wants to email you, Barry, what’s your email address?

Barry Trexler: BarryTatuaFinancial.com. Excellent.

Bill Neumann: All right. Well, hey, thanks everybody, Samantha, Conor, Barry, for being on the podcast. Really great conversation, a different conversation than we’ve ever had before. And I think this is going to be really appealing, I would say, to the majority of our audience. So I thank all three of you for being here and thank everybody for listening and watching this podcast today. Until next time, this is the Group Dentistry Now Show.

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