Originally Published MDDI November 2005

There are many ways in which a device company could be considered outstanding. Some companies are extraordinarily innovative. Others have an uncanny market savvy. Some are extremely thorough and persistent. And there are those that have overcome great odds to achieve success.

Erik Swain

This year, MD&DI has selected three companies to be Medical Manufacturers of the Year. All three companies are role models, but in very different ways. Each is at a different stage of development. One is a large company, one is a small public company, and one is a small private company. Each offers a different set of approaches to doing business, and each has achieved a different set of accomplishments.

Restore Medical (St. Paul, MN) is a small private company. It took the unusual course of first finding an underserved clinical need and then developing a technology for it, instead of the other way around. Along the way, it remained open to ideas from anywhere, including the aeronautical and textile fields. The end result was a product that revolutionized the treatment for sleep disorders.

Fox Hollow Technologies (Redwood City, CA) is a small public company. Rather than tackling the problem of plaque buildup from the conventional perspective of propping open an artery, it decided to attack the problem at its source, and developed a way to remove the plaque. It also found a way to meet bigger-than-anticipated demand despite limited resources. And it is on the cutting edge of drug-device collaborations, having recently announced a deal with a pharmaceutical giant to analyze plaque in ways that could lead to new cardiovascular drugs and diagnostics.

St. Jude Medical Inc. (St. Paul), a large company, epitomizes the persistence and perspicacity needed to make a device company successful. It has one of the most diligent and thorough testing programs in the industry, as well as one of the most stringent codes of business conduct. It has shown a true commitment to continuous improvement. The results have been success in highly competitive markets that has far exceeded expectations, and the ability to capitalize where others have made mistakes.

What follows are their stories. The details may be very different, but their ability to inspire is the same.

Restore Medical

Fox Hollow Technologies

St. Jude Medical Inc.

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