Reeling from hurricane and wildfires, Medtronic plans to reopen northern California facilities next week
Medical device company Medtronic was already projecting a $250 million financial hit due to Hurricane Maria before wildfires in northern California forced it to shut down four facilities in Santa Rosa on Oct. 9.
A Medtronic spokesperson said the approximately 840 employees who live in the area have all reported being safe, and the company plans to reopen three of the four plants next week. The company wasn’t prepared to estimate the financial impact of the wildfires.
"We are closely monitoring the wildfires in Santa Rosa, and our first priority is the safety of our employees," Wendy Dougherty said in an email to Cardiovascular Business. “We are keeping in contact with local employees to understand their personal needs and providing support. All four facilities in Santa Rosa are intact. We anticipate our Brickway, Coffey Lane and Skylane facilities will be open sometime next week; our Fountaingrove facility is still in an evacuation zone so we don’t know when that will open.”
As of Oct. 18, the death toll from the northern California wildfires was 42, with another 53 reported missing in Sonoma County alone.
It’s the second time in less than a month that Medtronic has been hit by a natural disaster. Hurricane Maria damaged all the company’s manufacturing facilities across four major locations in Puerto Rico, where more than 5,000 employees work.
As of its press release Oct. 6, Medtronic had tracked down 90 percent of those employees and most had returned to work. But even then, the facilities weren’t operating at full capacity.
"We are extremely focused on restoring our manufacturing operations in Puerto Rico as quickly as possible, as well as prioritizing our available inventory to patient surgeries over large volume orders from customers," CEO and chairman Omar Ishrak said in the press release. "While we are expecting a temporary impact to our financial results from Hurricane Maria, we are pleased with the early reception of our new product launches, which are contributing to the underlying strength and fundamentals of our business."
Just three days after Medtronic provided that update, the wildfires forced evacuation of its Santa Rosa facilities.
Daniel joined TriMed’s Chicago editorial team in 2017 as a Cardiovascular Business writer. He previously worked as a writer for daily newspapers in North Dakota and Indiana.