Medtronic to acquire ATS Medical for $370 million

Medtronic Inc, a global leader in medical devices technology, today said it has agreed to buy ATS Medical Inc for $370 million, including the assumption of debt, to expand its cardiovascular business.

Cardiovascular interventions represent the world's largest sector of the medical device market, generating $10 billion annually on a global basis. A significant growth opportunity within this sector is peripheral vascular disease, a large and underserved market currently estimated at $2 billion annually and growing faster than 10 per cent per year.
 
Approximately 20 million people in the US and Western Europe alone suffer from peripheral vascular disease, which causes pain, reduces mobility, inhibits wound healing and leads to approximately 250,000 amputations per year.
 
Minneapolis, Minnesota-based Medtronic will acquire ATS Medical by paying $4.00 per share in cash for each share of ATS Medical stock. The total value of the transaction is expected to be $370 million, which includes the purchase of ATS medical stock and assumption of net debt.

ATS Medical, also based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, develops, manufactures, and markets medical devices for the treatment of cardiac diseases. It makes prosthetic heart valves, mechanical heart valve, as well as ATS 3F Aortic Bioprosthesis, a biological replacement aortic heart valve among other products.

With 2009 revenues of $75.7 million, ATS Medical markets and sells its products in the US, as well as in Europe, the Asia Pacific and China.

Medtronic said that ATS Medical's innovative Open-Pivot bileaflet mechanical and 3f pericardial valve technology, along with its CryoMaze family of ablation products, will extend its current product offerings to cardiac surgeons.

The ATS Medical's Open Pivot heart valve was first sold in international markets in 1992 and the US Food and Drug Administration granted approval to sell it in the US in 2000. The company has sold more than 140,000 valves globally till date.