Health technology company Philips is investing more than $150 million in manufacturing and research and development in the U.S. and is expanding manufacturing facilities in Pennsylvania and Minnesota.
The company said the investments are in addition to Philips' annual $900 million research and development investment in America.
The company plans to expand its Reedsville, Pennsylvania, manufacturing facility, which produces AI-enabled ultrasound systems for hospitals.
After the expansion, the Reedsville site will begin to customize software and configurations of ultrasound systems for clinical procedures in cardiovascular, general and maternal care.
Philips also expanded its image-guided therapy facility in Plymouth, Minnesota, which will take on additional manufacturing and research and development projects over the next several years.
The Reedsville site will add 24,000 square feet of manufacturing space with 40,000 square feet of warehouse space and create 120 skilled manufacturing jobs.
Meanwhile, the image-guided therapy facility, which includes the construction of a new medtech training center, will create over 150 new jobs.
"Increasing our manufacturing and research and development capabilities will create jobs and accelerate our ability to deliver better care for more people with innovative AI-enabled solutions," Jeff DiLullo, chief region leader of Philips North America, said in a statement.
THE LARGER TREND
In July, Philips collaborated with Epic to integrate Philips' cardiac ambulatory monitoring and diagnostics services with Aura, the EHR company's specialty diagnostics suite.
According to the company, with Philips' technology available through Aura, health system IT teams could give provider organizations the ability to order and review patients' ECG results directly in Epic.
That same month, Philips launched the Philips ECG AI Marketplace. The platform provides cardiac care teams with access to multiple vendor offerings in a single, centralized location, helping clinicians manage and implement AI-powered diagnostic tools.
In January, Shez Partovi, chief innovation and strategy officer at Philips, sat down with MobiHealthNews during the JPM Healthcare Conference to discuss the company's advancements in pathology and radiology and its perspective on responsible AI development.
"I really do think that there's an opportunity for a tectonic shift in the industry and where you can really improve access to care with reduced cost of care," said Partovi. "It appears as though this iteration of AI and generative AI has the catalytic properties needed to make that happen. And so, what I would say worries me is wild and crazy claims."
In 2024, Philips received a warning letter from the FDA, which it posted, stating that an inspection of the tech giant's manufacturing facility in Suzhou, China, that makes CT and ultrasonography systems revealed it was not in compliance with the Quality System Regulation's reasonable manufacturing requirements.
The FDA said an inspection of the facility revealed the devices were "adulterated" in that the methods used in developing the products or in manufacturing, packaging, storage or installation do not conform to reasonable manufacturing practice requirements, according to the Code of Federal Regulations.
Specifically, the FDA said the company failed to "ensure validation of the injection molding process used by [the] supplier of the custom-manufactured Philips Incisive CT Patient Interface Monitor (PIM) data cable."
"Patient safety and quality is Philips’ highest priority, and we have intensified our efforts to strengthen patient safety and quality management across the company," said Steve de Baca, chief patient safety and quality officer of Philips, according to reporting by Health Imaging.
"We will address any identified quality management issues thoroughly and transparently, ensuring proper coordination with the relevant global competent authorities and regulators. We are working closely with the FDA to address the matters raised in the warning letter and are committed to completing the necessary actions in a timely manner."
