Seeking Alpha: Mindray's Quarter Won't Settle Diddly

Both bulls and bears can find information in Mindray's (MR) second quarter report to uphold their preexisting biases about the stock. Convinced that that growth is slowing and the company is seeing less margin leverage? There are data to support that. Convinced that Mindray can continue to exploit a huge market for quality value-priced medical equipment while generating good free cash flow? We've got you covered there too.

At a minimum, I'd say Mindray is in that awkward phase where the company is alienating pure med-tech growth investors, but not yet attracting the margin/cash flow-driven value/GARP crowd. Although I think recent ventures into immunoassay and ultrasound could pay off down the road, I'm not as willing to stick my neck out right now for a stock like Mindray.

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Mindray's Quarter Won't Settle Diddly

Seeking Alpha: Baby, Baby, Where Has The Love Gone?

Natus Medical (BABY) is a case in point as to why I'm always skeptical around growth stories built on rampant M&A activity, particularly when those growth stories are awarded the sort of multiples that go with the strongest organic growth names in the med-tech space. To that end, while Natus had a career-making run through the first decade of this century, the going has gotten a lot tougher post-2008, during which time Natus has lagged another famous (or infamous) growth-by-acquisition story Integra Lifesciences (IART) and other less-than-stellar performers like Medtronic (MDT).

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Baby, Baby, Where Has The Love Gone?

MassDevice: The Chinese Medical Device Market Driven By Both Growth And Value

In recent years, medical device companies in the U.S. and Europe have woken up to what pharmaceutical, industrial, and consumer goods companies have known for some time – China is a major growth opportunity. Even more recently, we've seen several well-known device companies step into the market more directly by buying domestic Chinese device companies. While China is indeed a huge potential device market, the realities of the market mean that companies who can focus on value may in fact be the ones best-positioned for growth.

Please follow this link for the full piece:
http://www.massdevice.com/blogs/massdevice/chinese-medical-device-market-driven-both-growth-and-value?page=show

Seeking Alpha: Zoll Medical About To Become A Very Interesting Growth Stock

Maybe it's true that if you look hard enough, there's always a growth story to be found in any industry. For more than a few years, one of the prime laments in the med-tech space was "where have all the growth stories gone?" Large companies scooped up many interesting small and mid-cap companies, while the poor IPO market led many others to stay private and/or sell-out.

Still, it is by no means true that Intuitive Surgical (ISRG) is the only worthwhile growth story left on the device side of med-tech. ZOLL Medical (ZOLL) deserves a place on this list as well, not only because the company is looking at its third straight year of double-digit growth, and not only because the company has excellent growth prospects from new products, but also because of what the company should be able to do with its operating margins.

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Zoll Medical About To Become A Very Interesting Growth Stock

Investopedia: Philips - Plenty Of Cloud, Minimal Silver Lining

Dutch conglomerate Koninklijke Philips (NYSE:PHG) has been an underachiever for so long now, it hardly seems fair to call another poor quarter a "disappointment." Nevertheless, the company announced that its fourth quarter results would be meaningfully short of analyst expectations and the stock is weak once again. Although Philips may remain a fixture on the "due for a turnaround" lists, investors would do well to stay skeptical about this company's ability to compete as currently constructed. (For more, see Earning Forecasts: A Primer.)


Another Warning
Although estimates have come down as much as one-third over the last quarter, Philips still found a way to underperform in the fourth quarter. Management guidance suggests that sales will come in a few percentage points below expectations, while margins fell off even worse. Based on an informal survey of sell side analyst expectations, it looks like Philips' anticipated EBITDA of 500 million euros will be some 10-20% short of estimates.


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http://stocks.investopedia.com/stock-analysis/2012/Philips--Plenty-Of-Cloud-Minimal-Silver-Lining-PHG-SI-GE-CREE0111.aspx

Investopedia: SonoSite Finds Its Deal

There was little mystery in seeing SonoSite (Nasdaq:SONO) get an acquisition bid. Not only has this relatively small manufacturer of portable ultrasound systems been a logical target for years, but the company began to actively and explicitly sell itself starting back in November. In a week that has seen another logical target (Synovis (Nasdaq:SYNO) get a bid from a not-so-likely buyer (Baxter (NYSE:BAX), the fact that it was Japan's Fujifilm that stepped up to buy the company makes this an a somewhat unusual story.

The Deal  
Fujifilm will be acquiring SonoSite for $995 million in cash, or about $54 per share. That's a 28% premium to Wednesday night's close and a 75% premium to the price of SonoSite's stock before it was widely known that the company was looking to sell. SonoSite is going out at a little more than three times trailing revenue, a multiple curiously similar to that of Synovis and one that is not all that robust by historical small-cap med-tech standards, but isn't so unreasonable given the performance of the company. (For related reading, see An Introduction To Small Cap Stocks.)

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http://stocks.investopedia.com/stock-analysis/2011/SonoSite-Finds-Its-Deal-SONO-GE-SI-PHG-MR-SYNO-BAX1219.aspx