The Advanced Medical Technology Assn. or AdvaMed, is moving from the land of policy to the land of production.

The national council for the medical device industry officially kicked off its AdvaMed 2012 conference at a reception at Fenway Park. The council will bring its annual conference to the Bay State next October. The move will undoubtedly bring the conference closer to the action.

“This is the first time AdvaMed will not be in Washington, D.C., which is good because it’s a fact that there’s not a single medical device manufacturer in Washington, D.C. anyway,” said Jose Almeida, the CEO of Covidien Plc. and the chairman of the Boston conference. Almeida was joined at the event held in Fenway Park’s EMC club this morning.

AdvaMed’s annual conference is typically held in Washington, D.C. where the industry council is located, but the group is looking to start bringing the event to new locations every other year, as a way to increase membership and build awareness for what Almeida called “the biggest and most important medical device event,” in the industry.

About 1,700 participants attended last year’s conference, which is still a ways off from some of the bigger medical device events held annually in New York, Germany and China. However, AdvaMed’s conference has managed to attract marquee key note speakers and a significant presence from top leaders in the medical device space. Former president George W. Bush is slated to key note this year’s conference in September, he will be the third former president who has addressed the gathering in recent years. Last year, FDA commissioner Margaret Hamburg, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid chief Donald Berwick and former CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric provided the key note address.

Conference organizers said Boston was a unanimous choice as the first city to bring the conference on the road to with San Francisco, Chicago, Minneapolis and San Diego as other possible future destinations.