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The
Early Years
The Move Toward Manufacturing
Early Pacemaker Research
The Hunter-Roth Electrode
Expanding Use of External
Pacemakers
Success With Implantable
Pacemakers
The Early Years
Earl Bakken, co-founder of Medtronic,
designed the first wearable, battery-operated, external
pacemaker.
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Medtronic had a modest beginning.
It was formed as a partnership in April 1949 by Earl Bakken
and his brother-in-law Palmer Hermundslie. The two men thought
of the idea while talking about Earl's part-time work at Northwestern
Hospital in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Earl had become familiar with the staff at Northwestern through
his wife, a medical technologist. The staff soon learned Earl
was a graduate student in electrical engineering at the University
of Minnesota and began asking him to repair electronic hospital
equipment. Hospital engineers could service heavy machinery
but were not trained to repair more delicate laboratory equipment.
Earl and Palmer recognized their opportunity. Earl left his
graduate studies, Palmer quit his job with a local lumber
firm, and together they formed a medical equipment repair
company they named Medtronic.
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Medtronic's first logo.
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The two men set up shop in a
600-square-foot garage in northeast Minneapolis. The walls
were built with lumber from refrigerator boxcars, and steel
bars, salvaged from an old bank, protected the windows. Electric
mats on the floor and a pot-bellied stove provided warmth
in the winter, water sprayed on the roof in the summer became
the air-conditioning system, and hand-built benches and desks
served as the furniture.
The new company had a slow start;
its first month in business, Medtronic grossed exactly $8
for the repair of a centrifuge. During the second year, Earl
and Palmer began representing several medical equipment manufacturers
in the Upper Midwest, and Medtronic started to grow.
The Move Toward Manufacturing
An early pacemaker that
operated on alternating current.
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As the servicing business grew
and new employees were added, Medtronic expanded into a second
garage and eventually occupied an apartment. More than half
of the company's revenues in the early 1950s were realized
on sales of other manufacturers' products.While
selling and servicing this equipment, Earl and Palmer became
well-acquainted with doctors and nurses throughout the Midwest
- among them the staff members of medical research laboratories.
Frequently, the research teams asked Medtronic engineers to
modify equipment or design and produce new devices needed
for special tests. The company responded by building custom-made
products and thereby entered the manufacturing business.
Although Medtronic built nearly
100 different custom devices during the 1950s, only 10 were
actually part of the product line. These included two external
defibrillators, forceps, an animal respirator, a cardiac rate
monitor, and a physiologic stimulator.
The product designs were roughly sketched; parts were either
hand-made or supplied by local electronics and surplus stores;
soldering irons and other assembly equipment were often shared;
and visual inspections provided the only means of quality
control. The Sunday paper served as packaging material, and
the products were shipped in boxes discarded by local merchants.
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