Medical device maker B. Braun Medical Inc. is planning a big expansion in the coming years.
The maker of intravenous solutions and bags for hospitals, which now has about 1,360 workers in Irvine and Westminster, plans to grow by 20% to 25%, or about 300 workers, in the next six years, company officials said.
B. Braun, part of Germany’s B. Braun Melsungen AG with its U.S. base in Pennsylvania, expects to grow with demand for its products, including the Duplex intravenous drug delivery system made in Irvine.
“We’re just seeing the beginning of our future, which is great for Irvine,” said Willem deGoede, the Irvine-based chief operating officer of B. Braun Medical. “We’re excited about the capabilities of Irvine. So we decided let’s stay there and start investing.”
B. Braun’s parent has $4.8 billion in yearly sales and 35,000 workers worldwide. B. Braun’s U.S. operations account for about a quarter of that, deGoede said.
In Irvine, B. Braun Medical makes drug, nutritional and other intravenous solutions. The company works out of a 650,000-square-foot plant that opened in 1974 as McGaw Medical Inc.
Company officials say B. Braun has been insulated from the global recession because the nature of its products always put them in demand.
“One of the good things about B. Braun is that we are,for the majority of our products,commodity products,” deGoede said. “Hospitals still continue to have patients, and the patients have a need for our products.”
By contrast, makers of pricier medical devices have seen their sales and stock prices slip as hospitals cope with issues stemming from lost investment income from Wall Street’s meltdown, the credit crunch and the prospect of treating more people without health insurance because of job losses.
B. Braun Medical isn’t completely unaffected. The company has put in some efficiency measures, including reducing inventory, closing plants in Puerto Rico and New Jersey and automating some processes, deGoede said.
For more on this story, see the Feb. 23 edition of the Business Journal.
