Medtronic fiscal 4Q profit climbs 28 pct

Medtronic Inc.'s fourth-quarter earnings jumped 28 percent with revenue topping analyst expectations and a gain from a business sale boosting the medical device maker's bottom line.

The company also said Tuesday it took a $118 million pre-tax charge in the quarter for a fiscal 2013 restructuring plan that will trim 1,000 jobs. Medtronic employs about 45,000 people worldwide.

Spokeswoman Amy von Walter said about 250 jobs will be cut from the Minneapolis area where Medtronic is based, and most of those employees have been notified. She declined to elaborate on where the rest of the cuts will be made or from what parts of the company's business.

The company also will add 1,500 positions during the year for a net gain of about 500. Von Walter said most of those jobs will be in emerging markets like India and China, and Medtronic's U.S. employee count will remain flat or rise slightly.

In the three months that ended April 27, Medtronic earned $991 million, or 94 cents per share. That compares to net income of $776 million, or 72 cents per share, in last year's quarter. Adjusted earnings, which exclude some charges and other items, were 99 cents per share.

Revenue climbed 3 percent to $4.3 billion.

Analysts surveyed by FactSet expected, on average, earnings of 98 cents per share on $4.23 billion in revenue.

Medtronic also recorded a $103-million after-tax gain in the quarter tied to the sale of its Physio-Control business in January. Medtronic agreed late last year to sell the business, which makes heart monitors and external defibrillators, to private equity firm Bain Capital.

The company also said its cardiovascular business revenue climbed 9 percent to $958 million, helped in part by the launch of the Resolute Integrity drug-eluting stent, a device used to prop open arteries. Sales from the company's cardiac rhythm disease management business fell nearly 2 percent to about $1.29 billion in the quarter. Spinal business revenue fell 7 percent to $818 million, hurt by a decline in U.S. sales of the Infuse bone graft.

Medtronic was hurt last June when a medical journal alleged that the company downplayed the risks of InFuse and did not disclose millions of dollars in payments to the authors who wrote the initial studies of the product. InFuse contains a genetically engineered protein that can stimulate bone growth. Medtronic said earlier this month that federal prosecutors had closed their investigation into the product.

Medtronic also recorded a slight drop in total costs and expenses to $3.27 billion in the quarter.

For the full fiscal year, the company earned $3.62 billion, or $3.41 per share, on $16.18 billion in revenue.

The company expects 2013 earnings to range between $3.62 and $3.70 per share, with revenue advancing 2 percent to 4 percent. That would amount to revenue ranging between $16.51 billion and $16.83 billion.

Analysts expect, on average, fiscal 2013 earnings of $3.66 per share on $16.52 billion in revenue.

Medtronic shares fell 56 cents to $37.14 in Tuesday afternoon trading, while the Standard & Poor's 500 index climbed slightly.

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