Stryker (NYSE:SYK) is expanding overseas again, this time with plans to hire hundreds of people as part of a "center of excellence" planned for Ireland.
The Michigan-based orthopedic medical device giant will announce this week formal plans to build a new facility by the end of the year at Carrigtwohill in County Cork, the Irish Examiner reported. The new facility, which will employ hundreds, will focus partly on creating hip and knee replacements using 3D laser printing technology, according to the newspaper.
Stryker already has 2 plants in Carrigtwohill that focus on making minimally invasive surgical instruments and hip replacements, employing a combined 700 people and another in Raheen, Limerick, that staffs about 500 people, the paper reported.
Stryker has made other moves recently to expand its footprint in Western Europe. In February, the company cut the ribbon on its new European headquarters in Amsterdam, Holland. The 59,000-square-foot facility, which includes a training center for healthcare providers, is designed to reach customers more easily and frequently.
“[W]hen most companies are leaning away from Western Europe, we’re leaning in Western Europe, and it’s just because of our current market share position, which is far below what it is in many other countries of the world," Stryker CEO Kevin Lobo said in a conference call announcing the company’s Amsterdam headquarters. "Having a state-of-the-art center in Amsterdam where we can actually train surgeons, these are investments that we just haven’t made in Western Europe historically and that’s 1 of the reasons why we’ve just never moved the dial [there]."