Medtronic And Johnson & Johnson Lead The Medical Equipment Market

The medical devices market is fairly concentrated, with a small number of large players constituting more than one-third of the market. The top ten competitors in the market made up to 35.8% of the total market in 2018. The market competition is characterized by the rapid changes resulting from technological advances and scientific discoveries. Medtronic Plc was the largest competitor with 7.1% of the market in 2018, followed by Johnson & Johnson with 6.4%. Other major players in the market include Abbott Laboratories, Becton, Dickinson and Company, Siemens Healthineers AG, Koninklijke Philips NV, General Electric Company, Danaher Corporation, Baxter International Inc., and 3M Company.

Medtronic is a medical technology, services and solutions company and serves hospitals, physicians, clinicians and patients in approximately 160 countries worldwide. Medtronic was founded in 1949 and is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. Medtronic Plc generated revenues of $30 billion for the financial year 2018 from the medical equipment market, a 0.8% increase from the previous year.

Medtronic’s growth strategy aims at innovating its product portfolio through collaborations and partnerships. In 2016, Medtronic plc collaborated with a mobile technologies company, Qualcomm, for a multiyear collaboration to improve the company’s continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) devices. Through this collaboration, Medtronic seeks to leverage its leadership in the diabetes management market.

Johnson & Johnson, which was the second largest competitor in the global medical devices market in 2018, is involved in the development, manufacturing and marketing of personal care hygienic products, pharmaceuticals and surgical equipment. J&J was founded in 1886 and is headquartered at New Jersey, USA. Johnson & Johnson generated revenues of $27 billion for the financial year 2018 from the medical devices market, a 1.5% increase from the previous year.

Johnson & Johnson’s growth strategy, similar to Medtronic’s, is focused on the expansion and development of its product portfolio through collaborations. In January 2019, the company collaborated with MedTech incubator, NXT Biomedical, to develop next-generation medical devices.

Other competitors in the global medical equipment market such as Abbott Laboratories aim to expand operations by acquiring companies involved in similar or diverse businesses in the healthcare industry. In January 2017, Abbott acquired St. Judes Medical, a USA-based medical device manufacturing company, for $25 billion. Again, in 2017, Siemens announced the acquisition of Epocal Inc, a developer of point-of-care blood diagnostic systems, including a handheld wireless testing solution called the epoc® Blood Analysis System.