Edwards Lifesciences Inc. (NYSE:EW) is looking to finish today’s session on a up note, with shares rising nearly 5 percent after European officials approved a third size of the company’s Sapien XT transcatheter aortic heart valve.
The CE Mark brings the 29mm valve to much of Europe and extends the reach of Edward’s Ascendra transapical delivery system — a minimally invasive surgical technique implanting valves through incisions between the ribs rather than a patients’ sternum.
Edwards and Medtronic Inc. (NYSE:MDT) are racing to be the first to get an aortic valve replacement on the U.S. market and have been waging war in the patent courts. Last year Medtronic lost a $74 million decision in a case involving technology it got with its CoreValve acquisition in 2009, but in February a federal judge in Delaware denied a bid by Edwards to keep the CoreValve product off the market.
