Christophe Lavigne, the cofounder, president and CEO of Austin, Texas-based LDR, has been named a 2011 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award winner for the Central Texas Region.
The company, founded in 2000 by Lavigne, Hervé Dinville and Patrick Richard in Troyes, France, makes spinal implants for both non-fusion and fusion applications.
The Ernst & Young award recognizes entrepreneurs, “who demonstrate excellence and extraordinary success in areas such as innovation, financial performance and personal commitment to their businesses and communities.”
Lavigne was recognized for his dedication and leadership combined with LDR’s ongoing success, global expansion, and growing contribution to improved patient care.
“I am honored and humbled to have received the Entrepreneur of the Year award. Since LDR’s founding with my two partners in 2000, our work has been exclusively focused on improving the treatment and clinical outcomes for patients suffering from spinal disorders. It is very satisfying today to be realizing our goals. LDR operates in more than 25 countries worldwide and earlier this year we surpassed 10, 000 implantations with our VerteBRIDGE Plating Technology platform, ” commented Lavigne.
He added, “In fact, our continued strong U.S. and international growth will necessitate a relocation and expansion of our Austin facilities by early 2012. And finally, we are very pleased to be in the FDA PMA [premarket approval] review process for both our single- and two-level Mobi-C Cervical Artificial Disc IDE [investigational device exemption] trials.”
