EU Approves Joint Venture of Draeger and Siemens

The European Commission has approved the joint venture in the acute hospital care market proposed by Draegerwerk AG (Luebeck, Germany) and Siemens Medical Solutions (Erlangen, Germany).

The approval is subject to several conditions. One is that Siemens shall sell its Life Support Systems unit (anesthesia and ventilation devices) to a third party. Also, the joint venture shall continue to supply open data interfaces to enable integration of its products and devices with those of third parties. The goal of the joint venture is the seamless integration of acute care information within the hospital information technology (IT) network.

Draeger contributes its entire Medical Division to the joint venture, while Siemens contributes its Patient Care Systems (patient monitoring), a unit that together with Life Support Systems made up the Electromedical Systems Division of Siemens. The joint venture will be called Draeger Medical and will be headquartered in Luebeck. The percentage each company holds in the venture is 65% for Draeger and 35% for Siemens. Draeger Medical is forecasting that the joint venture will deliver double-digit sales growth in 2003, in contrast to the preceding year.

"We are expanding our portfolio to include monitoring, which is an integral component of our customers' clinical processes. The expanded portfolio will put Draeger Medical in a better position for developing process-oriented solutions in acute hospital care,” said Dr. Wolfgang Reim, CEO of Draeger Medical.