Medical device company Bovie dumps electrosurgical products to settle patent suit

Bovie Medical Corp. (NYSE:BVX) is pulling a pair of electrosurgical devices off the market to settle a patent infringement lawsuit with Salient Surgical Technologies and Medtronic Inc. (NYSE:MDT).

Bovie Medical said the agreement calls for it to yank its Seer and Boss monopolar and bipolar saline-enhanced radio-frequency devices from the worldwide market, in return for $750,000 from Medtronic and the chance to strike an OEM contract with Salient Surgical. (Bovie already has such a deal going with Medtronic.)

The lawsuit, filed last summer in the U.S. District Court for Delaware, accused Bovie of violating a trio of patents licensed to Portsmouth, N.H.-based Salient. That company’s Aquamantys system competes with the Bovie products and is based on patents licensed from Medtronic.

Salient, founded as TissueLink Medical in 1999, banked $15 million from its seventh funding round in January 2010. Its backers include Medtronic ’ which owns a nearly 9 percent stake in the company ’ TLM Investors, QuestMark Advisors and the RiverVest Venture Fund.

Bovie Medical president and CEO Andrew Makrides said the company decided to settle after considering the cost of continuing to fight the suit and the possibility that it still might lose the case.

“After carefully weighing the considerable costs of continued litigation and the inherent uncertainty in this type of action, management concluded that this settlement was in the best interest of the company and its shareholders,” makrides said. “With this issue behind us, we can focus increased resources and efforts on our J-Plasma technology and other new products.”

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