A new market in hospital intensive care units has opened up for companies glucose monitoring technologies and it represents a double-digit growth opportunity both for companies with continuous glucose monitors and critical care franchises. As partners,, Edwards Lifesciences and Dexcom bring both the marketing and technological strengths to successfully compete in this new market.

When GlucoLight was founded in 2003 to bring to market an optical platform for non-invasive glucose monitoring-specifically, optical coherence tomography-its founders decided to set themselves apart from the pack in two ways. First, they would focus on generating clinical data, and letting that data speak for itself. The company has conducted six clinical trials to date. Second, they would validate its platform in an emerging market that needs a technological solution but that is well-validated from the clinical perspective: glucose monitoring in the hospital critical care environment. This market also offers a faster time to market because there is no requirement to miniaturize the monitor for the ICU environment. Part of a group of articles that includes: "Where are They Now? Checking in on Three Glucose Monitoring Companies," "A Decade of Development of SMSI: Will it Yield Improved Accuracy in CGM?" and "Pelikan Swoops in on the Big Four."

Laying out a strategy is one thing; executing it is another. That's why, from time to time, START-UP revisits companies it has written about in the past to find out what went according to plan, and what didn't. As we revisit the field of glucose monitoring--a field with a high attrition rate, we'll see if we can draw out some lessons, both from the successes and from the failures, for those starting out today. (Introduction to three separate articles in the December 2007 issue: "Pelikan Technologies Swoops in on the Big Four"; "A Decade of Development for SMSI: Will It Yield Improved Accuracy in CGM?" and "GlucoLight Makes Non-invasive Glucose Monitoring Real.")

A roundup of recent medtech strategic alliances, mergers & acquisitions and financings.