Boston Scientific has moved all production of its drug-eluting stents to its Galway operation. The Galway plant was already producing about 60 per cent of the company’s supply of stents, according to Michael Onuscheck, the medical device giant’s executive responsible for businesses in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Addressing the Irish Venture Capital Association annual dinner, Mr Onuscheck confirmed that the US group had now moved the rest of its drug-eluting stent manufacturing to its Galway plant, one of three the company has in Ireland, where it employs about 5,000 people. (Stents are a form of scaffold placed in diseased arteries.)

Mr Osnacheck said the “drought-like” conditions regarding the availability of early stage capital for medtech firms was an issue of serious concern to “consolidating companies” such as Boston Scientific, which were in the market for innovative start-ups in areas where either they did not have the resources or the “guts to do it ourselves”. “The ecosystem required to support innovation is breaking down,” he said.