Companion Medical will help the company expand its diabetes management offerings, as reported by Catherine Roberts and Joe Carlson for the Star Tribune newspaper in the USA.
Medtronic is buying Companion Medical, a San Diego-based firm that makes the only smart insulin pen with an integrated diabetes management app approved by the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA in June expanded Companion Medical’s InPen for use in all people over 7 years of age. Through use of the app, patients can receive custom doses of insulin through a more manageable and reusable pen.
“This acquisition is an ideal strategic fit for Medtronic as we further simplify diabetes management and improve outcomes by optimizing dosing decisions for the large number of people using multiple daily injection,” said Sean Salmon, executive vice president and president of the Diabetes Group at Medtronic. “We look forward to building upon the success of the InPen by combining it with our intelligent algorithms to deliver proactive dosing advice personalized to each individual,” he said. He added that the system allows people with diabetes to think less about it and live more freely.
The company said the acquisition of Companion Medical builds upon the company’s purchases of Nutrino and Klue as it builds up technology to design algorithms and artificial intelligence to manage diabetes. Medtronic also said it will look to expand the availability of InPen globally.
