Stryker, a leading medical equipment manufacturer in Portage (near Kalamazoo), has acquired Boston’s Amplitude Vascular Systems Inc. (AVS) from Charlevoix-based BioStar Capital for $835 million.
AVS is a medical technology company that created a next-generation hydraulic intravascular lithotripsy (IVL) platform to treat calcified peripheral arterial disease. BioStar Capital is a venture capital firm focused on transformative medical technologies.
About one in 20 U.S. adults, aged 20 and older, have calcified arteries, the treatment of which costs approximately $100 billion in aggregate annually. AVS’s Pulse System is an alternative to the current interventions that use electric wired balloons and lasers.
AVS’s technology, which delivers CO₂-generated pressure waves through a balloon catheter, optimizes arterial diameter while potentially minimizing damage and increasing catheter deliverability, treatment speed, and therapeutic efficacy.
BioStar Capital, with offices in Michigan and Ohio, was founded by Dr. Louis Cannon, a physician who first encountered the idea for hydraulic lithotripsy while serving on the University of Michigan’s Coulter Committee.
BioStar Capital served as an early strategic growth partner of AVS, licensing the IP, providing initial startup capital, and guiding the startup through several phases of development and approvals, including clinical studies and first-in-human trial design.
“We are doctors first and investors second, which means we look for emerging technologies that solve the needs of physicians and patients, then work to make the product better and scalable,” says Cannon, senior managing director of BioStar. “The data shows that this device is uniquely safe and effective.
“Its potential for tremendous impact on patients’ lives has only increased with the benefit of Stryker’s resources and reach.”
For more information, visit avspulse.com/.
