NOBLESVILLE,
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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
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
"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
David
Johnson, CEO of BioCrossroads, which promotes
"(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.