Exclusive | Exclusive interview with the senior vice president of emerging markets at Envista: We lo

"Excuse me, sir, we only have tea here."

At the Dentech exhibition in Shanghai, a waiter politely interrupted Noel Wentworth's coffee order in the tea room. The Senior Vice President of Emerging Markets at Envista paused for a moment, then smiled: "A cup of Chinese black tea, please. It's one of my favorites."

From coffee to black tea—this small adjustment is a metaphor for his 15-year relationship with China.When he first arrived in Shanghai in early 2011, this Australian was still adapting to the unfamiliar business rhythm and cultural context; now, he regards this land as another home. What has changed is not only his beverage preferences, but also Envista's identity in China: from an occasional "guest" to an "insider" integrated into daily life; from occasionally "eating out" to taste exotic flavors to deeply rooted in the city, eating "home-cooked meals" every day.

How did a multinational corporation transform from a "market entrant" to a "localized participant" over the past 15 years?What made Noel so convinced?China is not only a huge consumer market, but also a strategic location worthy of long-term investment and deep symbiosis.

Investing in China is a must.

Noel's connection with China began in 2011-2012. He spent two years in Shanghai planning the construction of a factory for the French biodiagnostics company bioMérieux—at that time, he had already been deeply involved in the healthcare industry for many years and had just pushed the company's clinical diagnostics revenue to [a certain level].More than 250 million US dollars。That experience allowed him to feel the vitality and resilience of the Chinese market up close for the first time.

"Back in 2009, people told us that investing in China might not be a good idea," he recalled. "Three years later, they were wrong. Then people said the same thing, and three years later, they were wrong again. Every three or four years, there's a cycle where someone questions whether it makes sense. But every time, they're wrong." This cyclical questioning and disproving precisely reflects the blind spots in the outside world's understanding of the Chinese market—they see fluctuations, while Noel sees trends.

*Noel Wentworth's public speaking moments

This confidence isn't blind optimism, but rather stems from a profound understanding of the market's essence. In Noel's view, the allure of the Chinese market lies not only in its large size and rapid growth, but also in "the inherent spirit of continuous improvement and the pursuit of excellence in the Chinese character." This spirit reminds him of Envista's EBS philosophy—always asking "how can we do better?" "This cultural resonance is something we struggle to find in many markets," he says. "That's the deepest level of harmony."

Ultimately, this recognition translates into real financial investment.

Left: Invictus Suzhou Original Factory | Right: Invictus Announces the Launch of China New Intelligent Manufacturing Base Project

On July 2, 2025, Envista announced the construction of a new factory in Suzhou, with an investment of nearly 1 billion RMB. This marks the first time Nobel Biocare implants and Ormco orthodontic brackets will be manufactured in China, a move hailed by the industry as the beginning of the "China Factory 2.0" era. This decision has attracted considerable attention within the industry.Is launching a high-end product line appropriate given the current weak consumer confidence and slowing market growth? Is it a gamble, or a strategic necessity?

Noel's answer was surprisingly calm: "This is a long-term investment, not a last-minute reaction." He observed that the Chinese dental market is undergoing a profound structural transformation—evolving from "rapid growth" to "value-driven."Chinese KOLs and clinical experts now have significantly higher standards for product quality than their counterparts in the US and Europe. They want world-class solutions, not just 'good enough' alternatives.This upgrade in demand is reshaping the competitive landscape of the entire industry.

More realistic considerations stem from multiple drivers including policy, customer demand, and supply chain efficiency. Noel said:"More importantly, it depends on supply chain resilience, responsiveness, and cost efficiency."This new factory will be the first in China to produce Nobel Biocare implants and Ormco orthodontic brackets locally, bringing products closer to customers and enabling faster response times—not just reducing logistics costs, but also establishing a supply chain system that can quickly adapt to local needs. In fact, Envista already has a precedent for localization in China: its existing Suzhou factory, producing SPARK invisible aligner products, is already serving multiple markets in the Asia-Pacific region.

In Noel's words,They prefer to "build kitchens locally and use local ingredients" rather than "airfreight pre-made meals from thousands of miles away"—that's what true "home-cooked meals" are all about.Behind this metaphor lies a fundamental shift in a multinational corporation's identity with the Chinese market: from "guest" to "family," from occasional visits to long-term commitment. This transformation is profoundly changing Envista's operating logic and value creation methods in China.

EBS Practices in China

If investing in China is Envista's strategic choice, then EBS (Envista Business System) is the underlying operating system supporting this strategy—it is not a simple management tool, but a continuously evolving corporate culture gene.

*Introduction to Envista EBS System

EBS originated from Danaher's DBS (Danaher Business System). This management philosophy, centered on continuous improvement, not only propelled Danaher to global industrial giant status but also earned its place in the Harvard Business School case study library due to its systematic nature and replicability. After Envista separated from Danaher in 2019, it upgraded this system to EBS, making it a core pillar of the company's operations. However, what truly allowed EBS to take root in China was not simply copying Western experience, but rather its profound resonance with the Chinese entrepreneurial spirit.

“EBS has never been a rigid operating manual,”Noel's tone was firm,Its core isn't about telling you 'follow these steps and you'll succeed,' but about establishing a mindset—always asking 'How can we do it better?' We provide tools and frameworks, but more importantly, we cultivate a culture of proactive improvement. This is a dynamic, evolving process, not a static blueprint replication.

This philosophy found an unexpected resonance in China. Noel observed that Chinese entrepreneurs inherently possess the gene for rapid iteration and continuous optimization. "Look at the automotive industry. 20 years ago, Korean cars were considered low-end products, but today Hyundai and Kia have become top-tier global brands. The Chinese market has followed a similar trajectory—a product may not be perfect when it is first launched, but it often reaches world-class standards within 10 years. This spirit of 'improving as we go, getting better and better' is highly consistent with the core of EBS."

More noteworthy is that EBS's practices in China have transcended Envista's corporate boundaries. The company is "spilling over" this methodology to institutional clients—not only providing products, but also helping them systematically optimize their patient flow, improve staff efficiency, and establish quality control systems. This approach is rare among multinational corporations: most suppliers stop at product delivery, while Envista chooses to delve into the core of their clients' operations.

*Envista employees are using EBS tools to improve their operations.

"We do more than just sell equipment and consumables; we help our clients build sustainable operational capabilities," Noel added, highlighting a key detail: Envista has trained a group of EBS-certified professionals in China. "Almost every month, employees pass certification exams in different modules. These systematically trained team members can provide more professional support to dental institutions in China—from standardized process design to the establishment of quality management systems—helping them maintain service consistency during rapid expansion."

This "management-teaching" approach reflects Envista's understanding of partnerships, which has transcended the traditional supplier role. Noel's explanation is quite insightful:"True partnerships shouldn't stop at the transaction level. We've accumulated decades of experience in operations, finance, and supply chain management globally. If these capabilities can help our clients become stronger, why should we keep them to ourselves? When our experience is shared, the ultimate beneficiaries aren't just individual companies, but the entire industry ecosystem."

Partner! Partner!

Noel's transition from clinical microbiologist to business leader led him to focus on one thing in particular:When I worked in the hospital, many suppliers never listened to what I had to say. So, after entering the business world, the most important thing for me is to listen to my customers.

This kind of "listening" is not just politeness, but the ability to truly understand the deep needs of clients. Over the past few years, Envista has interviewed hundreds of DSOs (Dental Service Organizations) worldwide. Noel discovered that what dental institutions really want is not suppliers, but strategic partners—"They don't want just anyone who sells products; they want partners who can grow together."

Noel Wentworth's working hours

Product quality is fundamental, but training and empowerment are even more crucial.“You have to teach customers how to use it,” Noel emphasized. Expanding from one store to dozens requires standardized and replicable processes. This involves not only technical support but also building the entire operational system—How to ensure that the service quality of each store is not compromised, how to maintain the technical level of the medical team during rapid expansion, and how to maintain brand value while scaling up.

This concept of partnership is vividly illustrated in Envista's collaboration with Next Smile, an Australian DSO organization.This organization, with only about 20 stores, has chosen an unconventional path—focusing on All-on-4 grafting and restoration."They don't do routine restorations, they don't do individual plantings, they focus solely on All-on-4," Noel said. Behind this focus lies a deep understanding of the niche market and a relentless pursuit of technological advancement.

*Next Smile Australia Team

Envista's role extends far beyond simply providing implants. "We film interviews with doctors and post them on social media," Noel explains, mentioning Dr. Larry, a veteran in the All-on-4 field whose interview video garnered 7 million views—"a very impressive number in Australia." Behind this number...This reflects both a doctor's years of technical expertise and Envista's efforts to help its partners build personal brands and expand their influence.

"The doctors are very skilled, but they're not good at building their personal brands. We help them go from ordinary doctors to star doctors," Noel said. "Your success is our success." This "customer success" philosophy transforms the supply relationship from a simple buying and selling transaction into a true community of shared destiny.

This deep collaboration is being replicated in China. In the first half of this year, Envista invited more than 20 Chinese DSO leaders to its California headquarters for exchanges. "I was so surprised," Noel said."Their understanding of DSOs and their plans for the future are more mature than what we see in many other countries. Chinese DSO founders aren't just looking to open stores and make money; they're thinking about how to build long-term brands and how to maintain high-quality healthcare."

Envista invites Chinese DSO leaders to its California headquarters for exchange.

"I have some good friends now who are clients I've met over the past six years working at Envista," Noel said. "It feels weird to call them 'clients' because they are friends."True partnerships are about mutual understanding and mutual success.It's completely different from doing business.

Smiling China is a "main course".

The value of partnerships extends beyond the business level.When a company internalizes "customer success" into its culture, this philosophy extends to broader social responsibility—not only helping paying customers, but also helping the entire industry become better.

Based on this philosophy, when asked about the localization of ESG practices in China, Noel mentioned..."Smiling China"Strategy – This is not just a slogan, but a systematic attempt by Envista to deeply integrate its global responsibility philosophy with the needs of the Chinese market.

This strategy is reflected in four dimensions: innovation, education, localization, and social responsibility. In terms of social responsibility, Envista has established the Envista Smile Project Foundation globally, while in China, it focuses on oral health from children to the elderly through two major public welfare projects: "Daisy in the Mountains" and "Promise of Good Deeds".

*Envista participates in the "Daisy in the Mountains" and "Promise of Good Deeds" public welfare projects.

But what deserves even more attention is the educational investment behind these projects—"Over the past years, we have cumulatively trained [number of people] globally."200,000 people"Noel said, "providing approximately [amount] per year."15,000 peopleThe training includes mid-to-high-level medical technology training. This includes not only clinical skills training but also health education on how to care for teeth.

Behind this figure lies a hidden pain in the industry: some dentists did not receive systematic training in implant techniques during their undergraduate studies. As market demand for implant restorations grows rapidly, clinical training has failed to keep pace. "We come from a medical background, so we know all too well how important training is," Noel said."A mistake during implant surgery can have disastrous consequences. Therefore, we have a responsibility to ensure that clinicians receive the best possible education."

*Nobelco Training Center "Master Face-to-Face Workshop"

However, Noel emphasized that these projects are not simply "doing charity"."We won't publicize these efforts; they are part of our long-term responsibility."He said,"The social responsibility of the healthcare industry is to raise the overall standard of the industry."Behind this statement lies a deeper business philosophy—true social responsibility is not about charitable acts that add icing on the cake, but about continuous investment in industry infrastructure.

In the short term, this investment in training may not yield direct returns. But Noel cares about something else entirely—the overall quality of treatment and patient safety across the industry. This "educational responsibility" even extends to EBS training. "We've started teaching continuous improvement and EBS principles in some training programs," he says, "so that clinicians not only understand the techniques, but also how to run their clinics more effectively."

This may be the true meaning of "Smiling China"—not treating the Chinese market as a profit-making arena, but rather systematically embedding its capabilities into the local ecosystem to help the entire industry establish higher quality standards and operational levels. When a company is willing to invest resources in the long-term health of the industry, it is no longer just a supplier, but an ecosystem builder.

A foreign land is also a hometown.

"From guest to local business, from friend to partner"—this is the kind of identity transformation Envista is pursuing in China. And one of the driving forces behind this transformation is Noel's own career trajectory, which reflects his profound understanding of the Asia-Pacific market.

*Noel Wentworth at the Envista booth

When Noel joined Envista in 2019, he served as Managing Director for Australia and New Zealand, and then quickly rose to become Vice President of JPAC (covering Japan, South Korea, and Southeast Asia), where he now oversees the entire emerging markets business. Behind this rapid upward trajectory lies not only the numbers of performance growth, but also his ability to continuously validate a methodology in complex markets—how to find a balance between universality and localization in regions with diverse cultures and varying stages of development.

But Noel values ​​investment in people even more. When he talks about Envista's team of over 500 people in China, his tone reveals an unusual seriousness: "There are some truly outstanding talents here. Not only are they highly efficient and have excellent performance, but more importantly, they are open to innovation, willing to challenge existing models, and willing to try new solutions that might take longer to be accepted in other markets." This emphasis on talent qualities actually reveals a deeper logic—The foundation of high-quality development has never been capital or technology itself, but rather those who can transform resources into innovation and strategies into action.

In Noel's view, the core of high-quality development has never been a race for speed, but rather the continuous improvement of comprehensive capabilities. "We see some competitors emphasizing 'who builds a factory in China first,' as if it were some kind of victory," he said, with a hint of disdain in his tone, "but that's not the point."The key is how far your overall capabilities can go—not just manufacturing capabilities, but also your understanding of industry development, your contribution to the local ecosystem, and your commitment to long-term value.These are the things that truly determine whether a company can establish itself in the Chinese market.

This long-termism is also clearly reflected in Envista's attitude towards innovation. Noel mentioned a decision that impressed him: five years ago, the company decided to invest heavily in digitalization and intraoral scanner technology, even though Envista had a strong market position in traditional impression materials at the time, and even though everyone knew that this decision would be detrimental to financial performance in the short term. "One thing I like about Envista is:We are not afraid to make decisions that are more beneficial to innovation, to patients, and to long-term care, rather than simply trying to extract profits from old technologies."This courage to innovate is rare among multinational corporations—after all, giving up immediate and certain gains to bet on the future requires not only foresight but also a commitment to one's mission."

"Companies that treat other places as their hometown are considered 'one of us'."Noel concluded. This statement sounds simple, but its meaning is extremely rich. For Envista, it means deeply binding its fate to China's industrial upgrading and market prosperity—not treating China as a source of profit, but truly regarding it as a testing ground for innovation, a breeding ground for capabilities, and a place to shoulder responsibility."We are not just selling products in China, but creating the future of dental care together with China."This statement is not a marketing tactic, but a clear expression of a strategic commitment.

*Envista's global coverage

This commitment is not empty talk. The figures Noel revealed at the sharing session paint a clear picture: as a multinational corporation with operations in more than 140 countries, 20,000 products, 12,000 employees, 20 manufacturing bases, and 15 R&D centers,Envista's presence in China is continuously expanding – from a local team of over 500 people to the establishment of a new factory in Suzhou, and the location of one of its 15 global R&D centers in China.Behind every number lies a concrete interpretation of the word "putting down roots." "We didn't come to China to do business," Noel said, "we came to put down roots."

This is perhaps the true meaning of "home-cooked meals"—not just coming occasionally for a taste, not treating oneself as a permanent guest, but truly sitting down with family and eating around this table day after day. In this process, one gradually gets used to the local flavors, understands the local customs, and becomes an integral part of this family.

Interviewer's Notes

As China shifts its growth strategy from "growing bigger" to "growing stronger," the competitive narrative of foreign companies in China is undergoing a fundamental shift: it's no longer about "how many billions they've invested or how much land they've acquired," but rather...The challenge lies in how to deeply integrate technical standards, management systems, and the local industrial ecosystem.This is not a simple market expansion, but a long-term game about capability embedding.

Envista's story provides an observable example of this transformation.When the Suzhou factory transplants its global production capabilities to the local market, when the EBS system begins to spill over into the upstream and downstream of the supply chain, and when the investment in training 200,000 people continues to raise the industry benchmark—these seemingly independent actions actually constitute a triangular support structure:

• •Technology diffuser—By repeatedly iterating and adapting cutting-edge global implant and orthodontic technologies to the complex and ever-changing clinical scenarios in China, we have ultimately developed scalable and replicable solutions. This is not simply about exporting technology, but about giving technology new vitality through the refinement of local needs.
• •Rule introducer—By implementing the EBS lean management system, a systematic training network, and strict compliance standards, new boundaries of quality and ESG are being established in the industry chain, forcing upstream and downstream companies to upgrade their capabilities systematically; this “rule spillover” is actually redefining the competitive dimension of the industry.
• •Dual cyclic coupler— By leveraging China's engineering capabilities, cost advantages, and market insights, local innovation can be fed back into global product competitiveness, making China not only a consumer market but also a source of innovation; this two-way flow is the true meaning of "integration" rather than "entry".

If these three roles cannot form a closed loop, it can hardly be called "high-quality development."They must interlock and reinforce each other, eventually developing the ability to evolve on their own within their native ecosystem.Otherwise, no matter how much investment is made, it will only be a pile of capital, and no matter how advanced the technology is, it will only be a transfer of tools.

A detail at the end of the interview might offer another perspective on this conversation. When Noel posed for a photo with the staff, he carefully held his phone at a 45-degree angle—"My wife taught me this; it makes women look better."This thoughtfulness towards others may not be a deliberate performance, but it reflects another layer of meaning in "home-cooked meals": true localization is never about rigidly transplanting global standards, but about maintaining attention to people, valuing relationships, and having patience for long-term coexistence in daily interactions. Technology can be copied, and processes can be transplanted, but this habit of keeping others in mind is precisely the dividing line between "passersby" and "family."