St. Jude Acquires Balance of Epicor Medical

In a transaction designed to strengthen its position in the treatment of cardiac arrhythmias, St. Jude Medical, Inc. (St. Paul, MN, USA), has paid US$185 million for all the outstanding capital stock of Epicor Medical, Inc. (Sunnyvale, CA, USA). In May 2003, St. Jude acquired an initial ownership position in Epicor for $15 million.

Epicore Medical has developed a high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) ablation system for the epicardial ablation of cardiac tissue. Epicore's technology allows an ablation device to be placed on the outside of a beating heart and deliver HIFU energy across the wall of the heart to create very precise and complete lines of cardiac tissue ablation. The system has been cleared by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

"We have been particularly encouraged that the clinical results investigators achieved with the Epicor Medical HIFU surgical ablation system exceeded the contract milestone of at least 80% success, especially since the majority of patients enrolled in this clinical trial were patients in chronic atrial fibrillation,” commented Jane J. Song, president of St. Jude Medical's cardiac surgery business.




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