Mindray soars in Q1 with 21% Dx growth

Mindray Medical ($MR), China's largest devicemaker, has been working to differentiate its business, and the effort paid off in the first quarter as the company's swelling diagnostics segment led the way to 10.5% revenue growth.

The company hauled in $242.1 million in net sales on the quarter, above $219 million in the same period last year. In-vitro diagnostics sales soared 20.7% to $68.3 million, while Mindray's flagship patient monitoring business grew 3.9% to $99.4 million and medical imaging stayed about flat at $53.2 million.

All that growth made for $57.4 in net income, a 57% jump over the prior year.

Mindray's quarterly success largely stemmed from domestic revenue, as in-China sales grew 21.2% compared to 2.8% growth internationally, which CEO Li Xiting blamed on pricing pressures abroad.

"Outside of China, our good performance in Western Europe was especially hard-earned considering the challenging economic conditions in the region," Li said in a statement. "Emerging markets' sales were weaker-than-expected, but we are optimistic about the region's growth potential and will continue to invest this year."

As for the full year, Mindray expects 17% revenue growth over last year, which would mean roughly $1.2 billion in 2013 sales.

"For the rest of 2013, we expect China to be our primary growth engine, based on our strong market position and favorable macro healthcare spending trends," Li said. "... Going forward, we will continue to build a stronger global brand, improve our operational efficiency and seek attractive M&A and collaboration opportunities."

- read Mindray's full results