More than $50 billion was spent on acquisitions by Big 100 medical device companies from the beginning of 2011 through the 1st half of 2012.
Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) made the biggest splash with its nearly $18.4 billion acquisition of Synthes – surpassing the total value of all deals made in 2009. It alone accounts for almost 37% of the total value of deals made over the past 18 months. And J&J also dwarfed the competition in terms of the number of deals struck, at 13.
Want more deals? Download the 2012 MassDevice Big 100
Among pure-play medical device companies, Medtronic (NYSE:MDT), Stryker (NYSE:SYK) and Boston Scientific (NYSE:BSX) led the list:
Other notable deals in 2011 and 2012 include Danaher‘s (NYSE:DHR) acquisition of Beckman Coulter for nearly $7 billion. Private equity firm Apax Partners acquired Kinetic Concepts for about 5.73B, unique given that PE firms rarely make such large bets on the medical device industry.
Endo Pharmaceuticals (NSDQ:ENDP) also bucked a trend with its acquisition of American Medical Systems. Over the past 5 years, it’s gone the other way, with pharmaceutical companies selling to device firms.
