Vincent Gardès New CEO at Vexim

Vincent Gardès, a veteran of Stryker Corporation and Medtronic, Inc., has joined Vexim, a medtech company in Toulouse, France, as Chief Executive Officer. Gardes, with over 15 years of international experience in marketing, sales and general management in the medtech industry, is fluent in French and Spanish as well as English.

Gardès started his career in 1995 with Stryker Spine as Product Manager, Europe. In 1996, he was promoted to the position of Sales & Marketing Manager, Knees & Spine, at Stryker Spain. After returning to France in 1999, he served as Team Leader Hips, Europe, and then Group Product Manager Spine, Global, for Stryker Orthopaedics until 2002.

At the end of that year, he joined the Medtronic Group as Division Manager Europe, Spine. In 2004, he was promoted to the position of Business Unit Manager, Spine & Biologics, France, and then became Regional Business Director, France & Iberia, in 2007. In September 2008, Gardès was appointed General Manager, Iberia, at CR Bard, based in Barcelona.

Gardès’ move to Vexim comes as the company is accelerating the international deployment of the SpineJack, a minimally invasive approach to treating vertebral fractures. The company describes the SpineJack as a titanium implant that is inserted into a patient’s vertebra via a minimally invasive approach. Bone cement is injected into the restored vertebra to secure the vertebral structure. Company officials assert that a trained surgeon takes only 25 to 35 minutes to complete the entire procedure and those patients can expect a significant reduction in pain immediately. They report that patients are generally discharged from the hospital 24 hours following the surgery.