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Why the era of blockbuster medtech mergers may be over. Discover the quiet strategy that is winning in medtech M&A and other insights from the EY Pulse of the MedTech Industry Report 2026. Amanda Pedersen, Senior Editor, MD+DI, Informa Markets - Engineering October 20, 2026 Medtech just had its best M&A year in more than a decade, with disclosed deal value surging to roughly $130 billion. But the companies winning in this market are not the ones chasing the biggest deals. They are the ones willing to walk away from businesses that cannot clear a 5% growth bar. This and other key trends are identified by the latest edition of Ernst & Young's EY Pulse of the MedTech Industry Report. "There are the companies that are growing over 5%, and then there's the rest of the universe, if you will," said John Babitt, EY global medtech leader and one of the authors of the report. "And really, those companies that are growing at more than 5% are the ones that are being rewarded in the market." That's why over the last 18 months MD+DI has seen several companies making acquisitions in markets that are going to get above that 5% growth bar, and MD+DI has seen companies divesting businesses that don't have a path to getting to a 5% growth rate, Babitt said. "It might sound easy on the surface, but it also really entails making sure you're in the right end markets," Babbitt said. "I mean, certain markets are not going to grow at greater than 5%, and so I think we've seen a lot of investment go into markets like robotics that are growing well above 5%; diabetes is another area; structural heart; certainly pulse field ablation; and even some of the technologies that are going into neurovascular." But the days of the Medtronic-Covidien deals that fetch upwards of $42.9 billion are likely in the past. "Everybody always wants to see the big blockbuster deals, but you know, there's been a lot of research actually on this that big deals in medtech don't create long-term shareholder value," Babitt said. Zimmer's acquisition of Biomet (roughly $13.4 billion) and Boston Scientific's $27 billion acquisition of Guidant are just a couple examples, he said, which just have not delivered shareholder value over the long term. What has delivered the value to shareholders, Babitt said, are the adjacencies and/or tuck-ins. "Everybody, for the most part, has really kind of latched on to that strategy and has really deployed it now," he said. The difference with those, Babitt said, is that the companies have a legacy business where those acquisitions fit into. Abbott is already in diagnostics, and Boston Scientific was in the broader area where Penumbra was, making these deals more adjacencies than blockbusters, he said. Still, the deal value put them in the category of mega deals. Diana Hoff, EY Americas Life Sciences Sector Leader, said the companies pulling ahead are the ones that are pairing differentiated innovation with durable growth, stronger cash flows, and more predictable earnings that will require sharper portfolio and capital choices. "And companies need to be focusing investment where they have a clear right to win," Hoff said. Senior Editor, MD+DI, Informa Markets - Engineering Amanda Pedersen is a veteran journalist and award-winning columnist with a passion for helping medical device professionals connect the dots between the medtech news of the day and the bigger picture. She has been covering the medtech industry since 2006. Amanda Pedersen poses with her Jesse H. Neal Awards plaque after winning the "Best Commentary" category with Pedersen's POV After 18 years of reporting on the medical device and diagnostics industry, Amanda has no fear of speaking truth to power. That's important in an industry in which over half of the top 100 companies report more than $1 billion in revenue. In her weekly Pedersen's POV opinion column, she isn't afraid to shine a light on industry leaders for bad behavior. Her insights spark conversation about what price is too high to pay for corporate success in medtech. Amanda graduated from Northern Illinois University in 2003 with a B.A. in Communication. After a few years reporting for community newspapers, including the Galesburg Register Mail in Galesburg, IL, and the Marietta Daily Journal in Marietta, GA, Amanda spent 10 years covering the medical device industry for Medical Device Daily (now known as BioWorld MedTech). Amanda joined the editorial staff of MD+DI in December 2016. Want more MD+DI in your search results?

Closing the Zimmer Biomet headquarters is A big mistake. Dear Editor, The Sept. 3 announcement that Zimmer Biomet will donate its global headquarters on East Main Street to Grace College has understandably been presented as a positive development for Warsaw. The gift is generous, and Grace College has plans to utilize it for STEM training. But there's another side of this story our community should consider. Zimmer's corporate headquarters is more than a building. It represents the company's connection to the community that built it. Zimmer was born in Warsaw. Generations of local families have worked there, built careers and helped transform a niche company into a global orthopedic leader. Zimmer Biomet's corporate leadership already works remote and are distantly connected to our community. Ivan Tornos lives in Coral Gables, Fla. This is not hometown leadership. Leadership requires presence. Executives need to be in the cultural atmosphere of their employees. They need to feel the office energy when an initiative is taking off and also when one fails. They need to be aware of the subtle movements in a room. Those things cannot be reproduced through Teams meetings, emails, dashboards and occasional visits. The value of informal conversations is tremendous. Hallway or water-cooler conversations reveal problems long before they appear on an executive report. When leaders and employees regularly occupy the same space, misunderstandings can be addressed before they grow, and responsibility is harder to avoid. Warsaw has excellent examples of the value of leadership locality. Lutheran Kosciusko Hospital benefits from having CEO Chad Towner leading here in the community. Parkview Kosciusko benefits from having Ashley Wirges' presence. Maple Leaf Farms benefits from Scott Tucker living and working alongside his employees. These leaders are invested in the community. They eat at American Table, they go to churches here, they attend Third Fridays. Proximity to their employees means they can recognize when something is going wrong before a spreadsheet reveals it. Likewise, employees know there is a real person steering the business who is available to approach to discuss a problem. Coral Gables is 5,270 miles away. That separation is not only a weakness for employees, it is a weakness for the stock, which sits much lower than the average $110-$120 over the last several years. Leadership loses an important source of unfiltered information when they are geographically and personally removed from the people doing the factory and office work. History provides plenty of warnings about what happens when communities lose meaningful connections to the institutions that created their prosperity. Britain's industrial decline in the late 20th century demonstrated how damaging the separation of corporate decision-making from the manufacturing communities can become. Warsaw business/government leadership should be cautious about allowing similar erosion to occur incrementally here. Zimmer Biomet's donation of the corporate office to Grace College may be a good STEM learning center investment for Warsaw's future, but Warsaw didn't become the Orthopedic Capital of the World through distant leadership. Our town grew because Revra DePuy, Justin O. Zimmer, Dane Miller and Ray Harroff all lived and worked here in the same community as their machinists, tool-and-die makers and polishers. Proximity is an asset.

Zimmer Biomet to showcase Complete Shoulder solution designed to support surgeon flexibility. September 18, 2026 (WARSAW, Ind.) Sept. 18, 2026 - Zimmer Biomet Holdings, Inc. (NYSE and SIX: ZBH) today announced it will showcase its Complete Shoulder Solutions at the 16th International Congress of Shoulder and Elbow Surgery (ICSES 2026). Every shoulder case may bring its own clinical considerations. Zimmer Biomet's shoulder technologies are designed to give those surgeons the flexibility to select an approach that fits the patient, procedure and care setting. Zimmer Biomet will showcase robotic-assisted surgery, mixed reality navigation, pre-operative planning software, implant systems for anatomic and reverse arthroplasty and sports medicine technologies, including biologics. The updated ROSA(R) Shoulder System, which received expanded U.S. FDA 510(k) clearance in May 2026 is the industry's first robotic system to support both glenoid and humeral preparation for anatomic and reverse total shoulder arthroplasty techniques.[1][-2] The system adds improved robotically assisted glenoid reaming and humeral resection capabilities, building on the existing ROSA Shoulder platform. It uses digital tools to navigate patient anatomy and cross-validate findings to help reduce reliance on manual estimation. The system's data also integrates with the mymobility(R) Care Management Platform to leverage pre-, intra- and post-operative data. The goal is to provide surgeons with data they can use to inform decisions throughout the patient journey, supporting a more personalized and measurable approach to care. "The foundation of the ROSA Shoulder System is grounded in real-world surgeon insights," said Brian Hatcher, President, Sports Medicine, Extremities, Trauma, Craniomaxillofacial and Thoracic. "We partnered closely with leading shoulder surgeons, listening to their experiences in the operating room to understand exactly what they need in the moments that matter: visibility, precision, efficiency and flexibility." Also on display at ICSES is Signature Vision(TM), a compact, surgeon-centric mixed reality system designed to deliver real-time holographic feedback on instrument positioning relative to the surgical plan. It can also fit into smaller surgical environments without rearranging staff flow or setup. Navigation lives in the surgeon's line of sight rather than on a separate screen. The system is compatible with a broad implant portfolio; Signature Vision extends confidence through technology designed to work with implants surgeons know and trust. "As shoulder arthroplasty volumes continue to grow, we want to make sure surgeons have more than one way to close the gap between what they plan and what they deliver," said Hatcher. "This year's ICSES exhibit reflects Zimmer Biomet's commitment to delivering a complete shoulder solution approach from innovative pre-operative planning and robotic technologies to soft tissue repair and total shoulder arthroplasty." Products and technologies on display at [Booth 404] will include: Robotics and Navigation * The ROSA(R) Shoulder System - robotically assisted total shoulder arthroplasty for anatomic and reverse procedures with expanded glenoid reaming and humeral resection capabilities * Signature Vision(TM)- compact mixed reality navigation delivering real-time holographic guidance for shoulder arthroplasty (in surgeon evaluation) Upper Extremities * Identity(R) Shoulder System - dynamic platform system designed to enable the surgeon to tailor the construct to the patient in front of them in anatomic, reverse and revision cases. * Comprehensive(R) Shoulder System - including Augmented Baseplates, Vault Reconstruction System (VRS(TM) and Segmental Revision System (SRS); the Comprehensive Reverse has the highest long-term survivorship rate of any reverse shoulder system in the AOANJRR registry. In its 2025 Annual Report, the AOANJRR showed Comprehensive Reverse had a 10-year survivorship rate of 96.6%.[4] * OsseoFit(R) Stemless Shoulder System - bone-preserving implant designed to match the asymmetric humeral anatomy,[3-5] optimizing fit with left- and right-side options in five sizes for anatomic shoulder arthroplasty * Signature(TM) ONE Planner - 3D CT-based planning software designed to streamline pre-operative workflows with simulated join assessments and efficient case plan turnaround times[6] Sports Medicine * OsseoCoat(TM) JuggerKnot(R) Soft Anchor System, Tapestry(R) Biointegrative Implant, ActivBraid(R) Collagen-UHMWPE Suture and Genie(TM) Knotless Anchors - all part of the ZB-3(TM) Biologic Continuum for rotator cuff repair, spanning anchor, suture and biologic technologies About Zimmer Biomet Zimmer Biomet is a global medical technology leader with a comprehensive portfolio designed to maximize mobility and improve health. Ortho Spine News seamlessly transform the patient experience through its innovative products and suite of integrated digital and robotic technologies that leverage data, data analytics and artificial intelligence. With 90+ years of trusted leadership and proven expertise, Zimmer Biomet is positioned to deliver the highest quality solutions to patients and providers. Its legacy continues to come to life today through its progressive culture of evolution and innovation. Signature Vision Legal Manufacturer: MR Surgical Solutions, LLC, Bubenbergstrasse 1, 3rd Floor, 8045 Zurich - CH Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements concerning Zimmer Biomet's expectations, plans, prospects, and product and service offerings, including new product launches and potential clinical successes. Such statements are based upon the current beliefs and expectations of management and are subject to significant risks, uncertainties and changes in circumstances that could cause actual outcomes and results to differ materially. For a list and description of some of such risks and uncertainties, see Zimmer Biomet's periodic reports filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). These factors should not be construed as exhaustive and should be read in conjunction with the other cautionary statements that are included in Zimmer Biomet's filings with the SEC. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date they are made, and Zimmer Biomet disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. Published September 18, 2026 January 5, 2015 January 6, 2015