Ventilator manufacturer Corvent Medical relocates to NDSU campus

Fargo North Dakota is where we wanted to pitch our tent, this is the beginning of something special, you know we hope to be a cornerstone medical device company.

FARGO, N.D. (KVRR) – North Dakota’s science and innovation board has attracted another company with a $117,000 grant as Corvent Medical has set up shop on the North Dakota State University campus.

“Fargo, North Dakota is where we wanted to pitch our tent. This is the beginning of something special. We hope to be a cornerstone medical device company,” Corvent Medical CEO Richard Walsh said.

With the opening of the location, Corvent will bring more jobs to the Fargo community as well as a smart ventilator the company designs and manufactures the Respond 19.

“We’re the largest and leading research university in the state of North Dakota. The point of a successful research university to a community, to a state, to the nation and to the world is to connect the creation of of knowledge with better life outcomes,” NDSU President Dean Bresciani said.

The company was started at the beginning of the pandemic. Engineers worked to create what they say is a state of the art ventilator with more settings and flexibility for transportation than other ventilators on the market, but that’s not all that sets it apart.

“It can be stored for long periods of time and be used in an emergency and that’s because any of the perishable items that would normally be in a ventilator are external to the ventilator. So, one of the issues we had during the pandemic was ventilators were available but they were required to be serviced and no service people were available,” Corvent Medical Chief Technology and Operations Officer John O’Mahoney said.

The company has a five year warranty on these ventilators and a guarantee they won’t need to be serviced during that time. Walsh also says they will bring 100 jobs to the region in the next three years.

“We’re looking to hire from the local community. It won’t just be engineers. It’ll be lab technicians, it’ll be clerical, it’ll be every aspect in R&D and a manufacturing organization. So, if you know people looking for jobs, point them in our direction,” Walsh said.

Corvent Medical will be bringing production of the ventilator from California to North Dakota in the next year. Wahpeton is a possible location for a factory.