
Edwards Lifesciences Corp. (NYSE:EW) CEO Michael Mussallem said his company is on the lookout for acquisitions.
Mussallem said his company, the largest manufacturer of heart valves, could reach into its deep coffers to purchase smaller heart-device makers this year.
“We plan to invest aggressively in our future. We’re going to be substantially increasing our R&D by 20 percent [in 2011] and we plan to continue to be a long-term investor,” Mussallem told MassDevice in an early January interview.
At the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco, Mussallem told Bloomberg that his company may use its $360 million cash on hand for acquisitions.
In the last five years, there have been 265 acquisitions in the U.S. medical device industry, and the average purchase price was $162 million with an average premium of 41 percent, according to Bloomberg.
Listen to our full interview with Edwards Lifesciences CEO Mike Mussallem