Latin America fuels growth for medical device companies
14-Oct-14, South Florida Business Journal
Medical device companies will see growing opportunities in Latin America in the next five years as consumer spending power increases, Jim Hogan, president of Medtronic Latin America, said Tuesday.
The Minneapolis-based medical device company (Nasdaq: MTD) will soon top $1 billion in sales in Latin America because of an expanding middle class and increased stability in countries such as Mexico, Colombia, Chile and Peru, Hogan said at the BioFlorida annual conference in Fort Lauderdale.
The opportunities lie not only in selling products to these countries, but expanding infrastructure that allows wider access to healthcare, he said.
For example, Medtronic placed EKG machines in community clinics in Latin America. Cardiologists can read the machines remotely via telemedicine, helping save patients from heart failure.