Bloomington, Ind. – Buoyed by the rapid completion of enrollment in the U.S. clinical trial of its ACHIEVE™ drug-eluting coronary stent to be sold to and distributed worldwide by Guidant, Cook Incorporated announced today it will consolidate its U.S. paclitaxel-eluting coronary stent program to support that device exclusively.

Cook Incorporated’s PATENCY trial of the Cook Logic™ PTX™ Drug-Eluting Coronary Stent will not be completed, company officials confirmed. The company will focus its domestic efforts in drug-eluting coronary stents on ensuring the success of the ACHIEVE device after its anticipated U.S. introduction in 2003. Cook Incorporated will, however, introduce its V Flex Plus PTX™ drug-eluting coronary stent in Europe using newly developed balloon catheter technology upon approval of its CE Mark submission, which is expected in the second quarter of 2002.

“Given the unusually rapid enrollment of more than 1,000 patients in the clinical trial of our ACHIEVE stent and our strong expectations for the widespread acceptance of both the ACHIEVE and V Flex Plus PTX stents once they receive regulatory approval, we made a business decision to dedicate our resources and manufacturing capacity to ensure the successful launch of these two new drug-eluting coronary stents,” explained Phyllis McCullough, chairwoman of Cook Incorporated.

Cook will complete its ongoing U.S. clinical trial of the uncoated Logic Coronary Stent, the company confirmed. It also will continue its expedited research and development efforts for future paclitaxel-eluting coronary and peripheral stents for the U.S. and overseas markets.

With international headquarters in Bloomington, Ind., privately held COOK® (www.cookgroup.com) is a leading designer, manufacturer and global distributor of minimally invasive medical device technology for diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. Since its founding in 1963, Cook has created innovative technologies for stents and stent-grafts, catheters, wire guides, introducer needles and sheaths, embolization coils, tissue-engineered medical biomaterials, vena cava filters, implanted cardiac lead extraction equipment and other minimally invasive medical devices.