The medical device industry has become quite accustomed to megamergers that see two of its largest players join forces to generate a more robust product portfolio. In recent years, we’ve seen the marriage of Medtronic and Covidien, BD and Bard, and Abbott and St. Jude. It seems in medtech’s annual calendar, the year is represented by one of these transactions. What makes 2018 notable, however, is that no such deal occurred.

Instead, 2018 seemed to be the year companies pressed pause on major M&A activity, instead going with smaller, tuck-in style acquisitions that enhance existing capabilities and offerings. The biggest deal of the year was accomplished by Boston Scientific (page 94), which made a move for BTG for approximately $4.2 billion, and was also one of the most aggressive in acquiring firms in 2018.

Ironically, last year would have been associated with a megadeal seeing the aforementioned Boston Sci absorbed by Stryker (page 86), but that rumor was apparently much ado about nothing.

As I’ve done in Top Company Letters of the past, I took a look at the previous year to see what trends were uncovered then and how they compare to the current issue. In 2017, I dedicated most of the Letter to the divestitures and “refocusing” companies were doing. A great number of firms had shed capabilities that weren’t a part of the company’s plans going forward. While that still occurred in 2018, it seemed to be much less noteworthy this past year.

There were, however, a few exceptions. Siemens finally spun out its Healthineers unit (page 82) as a standalone entity via IPO. While the parent company still retained 85 percent of the ownership as the primary shareholder, the firm is now independent of the conglomerate, which will hopefully position it for greater growth.

On the other hand, GE Healthcare (page 60), which had been at the center of significant spin-out discussions, is likely staying a part of its parent firm. In February 2019, the company announced it would be selling its biopharmaceutical business to Danaher (page 99), closing the discussion of any further repositioning of the company. Meanwhile, Danaher said goodbye to its Dental unit, perhaps making room for the prospect of incoming capabilities.

In terms of the trends I observed via the happenings at a number of companies in this year’s offering, one would certainly be the rise in artificial intelligence (AI) and analytics-driven technologies being highlighted. For example, the University of Southern California’s Center for Body Computing—which maintains expertise in implantable and wearable sensors, smartphone-enabled virtual care, big data, AI/machine learning, and virtual reality to build patient-centric applications and services—teamed with Baxter (page 91) to develop life-sustaining digital solutions.

Elsewhere, 3M (page 122) brought in the technology business of M*Modal, a healthcare technology provider of cloud-based, conversational AI-powered systems that help physicians efficiently capture and improve the patient narrative so they can spend more time with their patients and provide higher quality of care.

Siemens Healthineers collaborated with The Medical University of South Carolina to enhance care. One such initiative involved the incorporation of artificial intelligence—referred to as “digital twin technology”—to enable planning teams to quickly determine the impact of changes that would be costly, if not impossible, to test in the real world, and help them forecast how well possible workflow solutions or health innovations may actually work.

GE Healthcare rolled out Edison, a next-generation intelligence platform that would allow smart products and applications to be developed, accelerating the adoption of AI technology in medicine.

This trend also overlaps with the other trend I noticed, which was the establishment of partnerships between medical device OEMs and healthcare providers, universities, and even other OEMs in the space. One such alliance saw Zimmer Biomet (page 107) work with Apple to combine a new app with smartwatch health-tracking data to analyze why some patients recover faster from knee and hip replacement surgeries.

A well-reported relationship exists between Johnson & Johnson (page 54) and Alphabet’s life sciences unit, Verily. The duo have said their combined efforts to develop a digital surgery platform that will feature the benefits of combining robotics, visualization, advanced instrumentation, data analytics, machine learning, and Cloud-based connectivity, will debut next year.

Review the reports to see what companies are combining forces in order to enhance technology, broaden capabilities, optimize the delivery of care, or delve deeper into innovation development. Find out what they’ve been doing as they catch their breath from recent megamergers. Discover insights into these leading medical device manufacturers. As always, I hope you’ll share any of the resulting thoughts you have with me.  

Sean Fenske, Editor-in-Chief
sfenske@rodmanmedia.com