1. Medtronic
Dublin, Ireland (operational HQ in Fridley, Minn.)
2018 revenue: $30,557,000,000
R&D spend: $2,330,000,000
Employees: 90,000
Revenues/employee: $339,522
Fiscal year ending: April 26, 2019
Last year’s rank: 1
Key Personnel:
Omar Ishrak, chairman & CEO; Michael Coyle, EVP & president, cardiac & vascular; Alex Gu, SVP & president, greater China; Hooman Hakami, EVP & president, diabetes; Dr. Richard Kuntz, chief medical & scientific officer; Chris Lee, SVP & president, Asia Pacific; Brad Lerman, SVP, GC & corporate secretary; Dr. John Liddicoat, EVP & president, Americas; Geoff Martha, EVP & president, restorative therapies; Karen Parkhill, EVP & CFO; Luann Pendy, SVP, chief quality & regulatory affairs officer; Mark Ploof, SVP, global operations & business services; Carol Surface, SVP & chief HR officer; Rob ten Hoedt, EVP & president, Europe, Middle East, & Africa; Bob White, EVP & president, minimally invasive therapies
Description:
Medtronic (NYSE:MDT) closed out 2018 with the sad news of the death of Earl Bakken, who in 1949 co-founded the company in an unheated boxcar behind his brother-in-law’s house. Bakken led the company for four decades, until his 1989 retirement. The year also saw a big-splash entry into the orthopedic robotics pool, with the $1.7 billion acquisition of Mazor Robotics, and a brief glimpse of the company’s plans to compete in robotic internal surgery against Intuitive Surgical’s da Vinci SP. On the financial front, Medtronic’s fiscal 2019 beat the consensus forecast, with profits surging 49.2% to $4.63 billion on sales growth of 2.0% to $30.56 billion. Although challenged along with other paclitaxel-eluting device makers by a JAMA study suggesting higher risk of late death for peripheral artery disease patients treated with those devices, the company was buoyed by the FDA’s decision to expand the approval for its TAVR devices to include low-risk patients. And just before this issue went to print, the company revealed a CEO succession plan that will see Omar Ishrak depart next year, to be replaced by longtime lieutenant Geoff Martha. During his eight-year tenure, Ishrak doubled annual revenues, added $100 billion to Medtronic’s market cap and sustained early turns toward global markets and value-based healthcare. But it’s acquisitions — including the largest-ever medtech merger, Medtronic’s $50 billion buyout of Covidien in early 2015 for which he’ll be most be remembered. – BP