QCOSTARICA – Bayer on Thursday inaugurated its new plant in Costa Rica where it plans to make its Essure permanent contraception device.
The 1,400 square metre (15,000-square foot) facility located in Barreal de Heredia will initially add about 75 employees to Bayer’s 350-member workforce in Costa Rica, where the company has its Central American and Caribbean headquarters.
According to the Coalición Costarricense de Iniviativas de Desarrollo – Costa Rican Investment Promotion Agency – CINDE, Bayer spent US$12 million on the plant.
“We are proud that such a prominent international company like Bayer has decided to invest in our country to expand its operations in the manufacturing of medical devices which demonstrates its confidence in the Costa Rican human talent and our country,” Costa Rica President Luis Guillermo Solis said in prepared remarks.
Essure, the only permanent birth control device approved for the U.S. market, is a small metal coil placed in the fallopian tubes via catheter. The FDA approved the device in November 2002 under an expedited pre-market approval process; Bayer acquired the device in the $1.1 billion buyout of Conceptus in 2013.