Allegations
The filed complaint alleges that Dentsply Sirona Inc. made materially false and/or misleading statements and/or failed to disclose that: (1) Dentsply targeted low-income people who did not have access to good oral hygiene education, a dentist, or dental insurance, which often meant patients signing up for Byte, a DTC aligner solution, had underlying dental issues that would have made them ineligible for treatment; (2) the push for Byte growth and sales commissions caused sales employees to sell to contraindicated patients; (3) as a result of the above, the Byte patient onboarding workflow did not provide adequate assurance that contraindicated patients did not enter treatment; (4) before and during the Class Period, reports of Byte patient injuries were pouring in; (5) Dentsply knew that its Byte aligners were causing severe patient injuries for years but did little to investigate those injuries or notify the FDA; (6) Dentsply had no systems in place to notify the FDA of these injuries, which the Company is required to do within 30 days of learning of a problem; (7) the FDA had received a sharp uptick in reports of serious injuries from Byte patients; (8) as a result of the above, Dentsply materially overstated the goodwill value of Byte; (9) as a result of the above, defendants’ positive statements about the Company’s business, operations, and prospects were materially false and misleading and/or lacked a reasonable basis at all relevant times.