Innovation, influence and business in America's medical cities.

In mid-May, Cameron Health Inc. struck media gold when the New York Times and the New England Journal of Medicine both gave prominent coverage to the company’s efforts to develop the medical device industry’s first subcantaneous implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD). Not bad for a relatively unknown startup in San Clemente, California. But a week earlier, Cameron struck managerial gold when it hired Warren Watson.

“Did you watch the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics?” Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minnesota) asked the mostly medical tech audience at a recent LifeScience Alley symposium on healthcare. “Did you see the 2,000 synchronized drummers?” I sure did. And like millions of other Americans, I thought: “Oh, crap. We’re in trouble.”

Medical device companies probably aren’t feeling the love from Wall Street, these days. The last two medical device companies from Minnesota to go public priced their IPOs far below what they expected. The malaise is not limited to Minnesota.

Medtronic Inc. (NYSE:MDT) won CE Mark approval in the European Union for its new drug-eluting coronary stent system.

It’s probably safe to assume that Medtronic Inc. (NYSE: MDT) won’t be championing states’ rights anytime soon.From product liability claims to doctor payment disclosures, the medical device maker based in Fridley, Minnesota, always has preferred a uniform federal standard — better than 50 different laws, the company likes to say.Yet there is one issue looming [...]

Canadian regulators have approved Medtronic Inc.’s (NYSE: MDT) technology to treat atrial fibrillation. Health Canada OKd the Fridley, Minnesota, company’s Ablation Frontiers Cardiac Ablation System, which uses radio frequency energy to kill diseased tissue that causes the heart to quiver or beat abnormally.

Medtronic’s earnings are bad news for the medical device industry and may indicate the global economy is in worse shape than people think.

Medtronic Inc. (NYSE:MDT) is quietly working on plans to develop a pacemaker that can deliver electricity to the heart without wires.The company, based in Fridley, Minnesota, confirmed to MedCity News begin_of_the_skype_highlightingend_of_the_skype_highlighting that it’s building a leadless pacemaker but offered no further details on the device, which reportedly can be implanted directly into the right ventricle.

Medtronic Inc. (NYSE: MDT) said Tuesday it will purchase Osteotech Inc. (NASDAQ: OSTE) for $123 million. The world’s largest medical device maker, based in Fridley, Minnesota, said it would pay $6.50 for each Osteotech share, a 65 percent premium over Osteotech’s Monday closing price of $3.94.

Medtronic Inc. (NYSE: MDT) has been under heavy fire in the United States for making consulting payments to doctors — money it says compensates doctors for their help in developing medical devices. But regulators and lawmakers, most notably Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), suspect Medtronic is paying doctors to push its products on patients, whether they [...]