NOBLESVILLE, Ind. -- In and out. In and out.

Getting bigger: Employees Tony Ell (left) and June Walden of King Systems of Noblesville work on the anesthesia circuits manufacturing line. Last month King acquired California-based Emergent Respiratory Products. - James Yee / The Star King Systems * Where: 125,000 square feet at 15011 Herriman Blvd., in Noblesville, Ind., and another 35,000 square feet in Kent, Ohio. * Employees: 540. * Revenue: $60 million. * History: King was started in 1977 by Flois Burrow. His son, Kevin, is now president. Kevin's cousin Bret is vice president of manufacturing; and his sisters, Kim Mace and Kelly Ranker, are vice presidents of administration and operations, respectively.

You're doing it right now. Most likely, you'll do it about a dozen times a minute while you read this story, all the while thinking about a million other things.

What you're doing is breathing, and, while you're sitting at your kitchen table reading the paper, it's likely very easy.

But when you have complications -- like a heart attack or an asthma attack -- you need help.

Enter King Systems, a Noblesville-based designer and manufacturer of respiratory and airway-management devices -- like the masks used for anesthesia, laryngoscopes and assorted plastic tubes that help keep airways open.

"If it's a product that helps people breathe, we are interested in it," said President Kevin Burrow. "We actually . . . have an impact in someone's life. That is a powerful motivator for us to do what we do."

Last month King acquired California-based Emergent Respiratory Products. Specifically, Burrow said, King is interested in Emergent's Continuous Positive Airway Pressure products, which emergency medical technicians and paramedics use as an alternative to intubations when they're trying to get patients to breathe again.

Intubation -- when emergency medical technicians stick a tube down patients' throats to help them breathe -- can be messy and somewhat frightening. Typically, this process is aided by long, metal hooks that hold down a patient's tongue, inserted while riding in an ambulance.

Emergent's product uses air pressure to keep the airway open.

Burrow predicts business from sales of the CPAP products will grow 40 percent a year.

"We think that's a sizable, respectable opportunity," he said.

And King Systems now is a sizable force in the medical-supply market.

Founded in Noblesville in 1977 by Burrow's father, Flois, the company has grown into a $60-million-a-year enterprise with more than 500 employees based in Indiana and Kent, Ohio.

King was purchased in 2005 by United Kingdom-based medical-device company Bespak, but it continues to be a family operation.

Kim Mace, vice president of administration, and Kelly Ranker, vice president of operations, are Burrow's sisters. His cousin Bret is vice president of manufacturing.

It's the largest private employer in Noblesville, said the city's assistant economic development director, Ben Bontrager.

King's Ohio operation, an hour south of Cleveland, employs about 120 people in various manufacturing positions and came from a 2003 acquisition of H&M Rubber, one of King's main suppliers of the material vital to medical-device manufacturing.

"We're a very vertically oriented company," Burrow said. "Ninety percent of everything we sell, we manufacture ourselves. We are a unique model. It's our model to compete against off-shore manufacturing."

April's $3 million Emergent deal gives King a controlling interest in the California company, with an option to buy the rest between 2009 and 2011 for up to $35 million.

David Johnson, CEO of BioCrossroads, which promotes Indiana's life-sciences industry, said King's acquisition further solidifies its position in the medical device market, and shows just how vital strong supply companies are to the life-science sector.

"(King) continues to be on a pretty steep path for growth. This (acquisition) allows them to do even more in the field. . . . Companies like this are really the backbone of this industry," Johnson said.