Baxa sees boom times ahead for medical device and software business: Corporate Growth Award winner aims to increase profits by 50 percent in 2010.

• Author: Lewis, David

Greg Baldwin, CEO and chairman of Baxa Corp., doesn't shy from a challenge.

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"We're probably going to try to raise our profitability, our EBITDA, about 50 percent (this) year," he says without the trace of a boast.

Baxa is a Douglas County-based medical device and software firm with annual sales of about $145 million that has been growing steadily in the annual 11 percent to 14 percent range.

Baldwin gratefully acknowledges the 2009 ACG Corporate Growth Award "celebrating a leading company with steady growth and annual sales exceeding $100 million," a description that fits Baxa like a glove.

Indeed, "steady" is one of Baldwin's bywords, as in "steady ownership" and "steady earnings."

But Baldwin says Baxa's performance the past few years wasn't good enough.

That's why another of Greg Baldwin's favorite phrases is "double down," as in "our company can rest on its laurels - or double down and try new things."

By which Baldwin means he aims in five years to double the company's employee count--to 1,000 or more--and revenue--to $300 million or more.

Baxa is a family business that changed with the 2006 sale of 27 percent of ownership to Goldman Sachs without losing the Baldwin stamp.

Baxa founder, chairman emeritus and vice chairman Brian Baldwin, 78, started the business in 1975 with the invention of the oral syringe that still makes up about one-quarter of company sales. Son Jeff Baldwin, 43, joined Baxa in 1991; in 1993 Greg Baldwin, 48, stepped in after a decade in telecommunications...