The Israel division of the medical device company Medtronic will provide the blueprints for its ventilators for free to companies seeking to manufacture them.
Yaron Yitzhari, the CEO of Medtronic’s Israel division, made the announcement to Israeli media network Arutz Sheva on April 1.
“Our goal is to prolong lives — to save lives, in fact,” Yitzhari said. “This is what’s needed right now, in the emergency situation we’re in, and this consideration comes before everything else.”
The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a global “demand for literally hundreds of thousands of machines, when global production usually runs to maybe a few thousand a month,” he said, adding that Medtronic already has doubled its ventilator production and is aiming to triple it in the coming weeks.
Yitzhari said that he didn’t think his decision would negatively impact the firm’s profit margin.
“Our company manufacturers thousands of products,” he said. “Ventilators are just one of those products, and this is an emergency situation. We have many other products that we sell for profit.”
The Simon Wiesenthal Center tweeted, “G-d bless Israel’s Medtronic and its CEO Yaron Yitzhari for releasing its patents and sharing the know-how for its ventilators to help save countless lives worldwide!”
G-d bless Israel’s Medtronic and its CEO Yaron Yitzhari for releasing its patents and sharing the know-how for its ventilators to help save countless lives worldwide! https://t.co/Aph2S4aseL
— SimonWiesenthalCntr (@simonwiesenthal) April 1, 2020
According to TechCrunch, Medtronic announced on March 30 it is releasing the design specifications of its Puritan Bennett (PB) 560 portable ventilator to help meet the global demand for ventilators.
Additionally on April 1, a team of more than 40 Israeli volunteers of various physicians, engineers and students released their blueprints for ventilators made from off-the-shelf components under the name AmboVent.
❝ The Open Source Ventilator Game Has Changed: @AmboVent and Medtronic COVID-19 Ventilators Open Sourced ❞ ー @RobertLeeRead, Head Coach of Public Invention Organization & Co-founder of @18F https://t.co/sy6sLjljTj
— Elad Ratson (@EladRatson) April 1, 2020
Components include the @arduino #ArduinoNano single-board microcontroller for kit building and @AndyMarkinc Snow Blower Motor! See @AmboVent's @Wikipedia page for more details:
🔗https://t.co/6sx1Zs469J pic.twitter.com/J1VZEv4JCF— Elad Ratson (@EladRatson) April 1, 2020
