KCI: In Wound Care, A Surfaces Company Goes Deep

Kinetic Concepts' 28-year overnight success story rests on an opportunistic acquisition designed to complement its core business in specialty beds designed to prevent or relieve wounds caused by patient immobility. In 1994, KCI acquired rights to the VAC (Vacuum Assisted Closure) Therapy System, a non-invasive wound closure device that uses controlled, localized negative pressure to help promote healing in chronic and acute wounds. VAC is now the company's principal growth driver, accounting for 71% of the company's revenues, and a growth rate of 28%. VAC has been everything that KCI hoped--and much more. But now, in order to penetrate the $3.3 billion markets that it is targeting, the company will have to move beyond the core hospital markets where it's been successful, to the more challenging extended care and home health care markets.