Medtronics Opens Worldwide Centers in Holland in Line with its Global Feel-Good Profile

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Researched by Industrialinfo.com (Industrial Information Resources, Incorporated; Houston, Texas). In March, Medtronic (NYSE:MDT) (Minneapolis, Minnesota) opened its largest and most integrated, 30,000 square meter, distribution center in the world. The $32 million facility is situated at Heerlen in Limburg province in the Netherlands.

The center sends more than 30,000 medical devices per day to help patients, hospitals, and physicians all over Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, Canada, and Latin America. The distribution center registers, stores, and ships medical devices and products that provide therapies and services that improve or prolong the lives of patients. These include pacemakers and defibrillators to provide therapy for cardiac disease, neurostimulators to treat Parkinson's patients and pumps that help to control insulin levels of diabetes patients.

Adjacent to the distribution center is Medtronic's Benelux and Nordic regional sales organization and the European information technology and financial shared services center. Medtronic has been represented in Limburg since 1969. More than 700 people work in the new center.

In the same week of the opening at Heerlen the Medtronic subsidiary, Vitatron, announced the opening of its worldwide headquarters in the Dutch city of Arnhem where the original company has its roots.

The new building houses Vitatron's clinical research and development department that pioneered the development of implantable medical devices for cardiac rhythm disorders. The building offers space for a state-of-the-art educational center to which more than 2,000 cardiologists and pacemaker technologists from all over the world to receive periodic training sessions with innovative pacemaker technology.

Unadorned public relations statements occasionally play straight as the most positive news items. Medtronic's 28,000 employees worldwide work for a company that in 2003 ranked in first spot in its sector in Fortune's annual list of 'America's Most Admired Companies."The company was also named as one of the top three companies in the categories 'long term investment value', ' quality of products and services', and 'innovation'. It was also named in the magazine's list of 'The 100 best companies to work for'. 28,000 employees must be feeling better already.