Stryker Pays $190 Million for Invuity

Stryker Corporation saw the light—cool light—and is acquiring San Francisco-based Invuity, Inc., for $190 million in cash.

Invuity announced on September 11, 2018 that its Board of Directors agreed to the buyout due to Stryker’s leadership in minimal access surgery which will, “facilitate better patient outcomes and operating room efficiencies in womens’ health, general surgery, electrophysiology and orthopedics.”

Spencer Stiles, president of Stryker’s neurotechnology, instruments and spine business, said, “Invuity’s innovative products in the single-use lighted instrumentation and hybrid energy markets provide best in class illumination and help make surgery safer.”

Invuity’s Waveguide XT System, a “Drop-In Illuminator” that rides along a retractor, was winner of a 2015 Orthopedics This Week’s Best New Spine Technology Award. “The device shines brilliant, thermally safe light anywhere along the incision to illuminate the entire surgical cavity. For the first time a surgeon can direct light—cool, brilliant, bright—into and throughout the entire surgical cavity by way of attaching the light source to the actual instruments like retractors.”

Intelligent Photonics

Invuity has a patented technology called, Intelligent Photonics.

The technology directs and shapes lights into broad, uniform, volumetric and thermally cool illumination. The light output comes via fiber optic cable which is coupled with a solid core optical polymer to maximize light output while minimizing heat. The complex geometry of the cable’s microstructures eliminates shadows and glare. Result: broad, uniform and brilliant, redundant illumination where you want it. In the surgical cavity.

The company says clinical applications include “… women’s health, encompassing breast cancer and breast reconstruction surgery, gynecology and thyroid surgery. Additional applications include procedures for general surgery, electrophysiology, spine and orthopedics.”

The product portfolio includes retractors, handheld instruments, drop-ins, blades, and a fluorescence imaging system.

Needham & Company, LLC, analyst Mike Matson believes Invuity fits well with Stryker’s instruments business and that Invuity’s products are applicable to a large number of surgical procedures.

Under the terms of the definitive transaction agreement, a subsidiary of Stryker will commence a tender offer to purchase all outstanding shares of Invuity’s common stock in exchange for $7.40 per share in cash. The deal is expected to close during the fourth quarter.