Here were some of the top stories from MedCity News this Thanksgiving week:
— Galleon Pharmaceuticals in suburban Philadelphia has raised $10 million to help discover medicines to treat breathing control conditions like sleep apnea and COPD. Started in 2003 by pharmaceutical industry jack-of-all-trades James C. Mannion, the Horsham, Pennsylvania, stealth company also is targeting treatments for ventilator weaning, drug-induced respiratory depression and obesity-related hypoventilation — all conditions in which breathing control has been disrupted.
— Medtronic Inc. (NYSE:MDT) is a company in transition as it seeks higher growth in China and new therapies like transcatheter heart valves while trying to “protect and optimize” its core cardiac rhythm disease management (CRDM) business. On Tuesday, the Fridley, Minnesota, medical device maker slightly lowered its fiscal 2011 profit and sales forecasts due to its weakening spine and CRDM businesses, the latter hampered by problems with a key manufacturing facility.
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— A small Columbus, Ohio, company is hoping to develop a blood glucose monitor for diabetics who are sick of pricking their skin to check their sugar levels. DIRAmed LLC is one of several companies looking to cash in on what’s certain to be an exploding market for products and services that help people better treat and manage diabetes. In 2030, there are expected to be 366 million diabetics worldwide — more than double the amount in 2000.
— It wasn’t the “big one” I wrote about last week, but Medtronic Inc. still is proving itself a prolific deal maker. The company based in Fridley, Minnesota, said it will pay at least $800 million to purchase Ardian Inc., a firm developing a catheter-based treatment for high blood pressure. Medtronic also said it will make unspecified milestone payments if the Mountain View, California, company hits revenue goals through 2015.
— Stories about Envoy Medical Corp.’s Esteem implantable device for hearing loss continue to get traffic (and comments), partly because talk show host Rush Limbaugh continues to pitch the product. It took nearly 15 years, $105 million, a name change and countless technical hiccups for Envoy Medical investors to finally see an endgame. More accurately, they can hear an endgame.
