Northern Indiana update: the region's top business stories.

• Author: Mayer, Kathy
• Position: REGIONAL REPORT NORTH

LIKE THE REST OF INDIANA and the nation, northern Indiana has had its economic challenges, but Elkhart, Kosciusko, Marshall and St. Joseph counties have good news to report, especially in life sciences and medical products manufacturing.

Life sciences strong. Warsaw is cementing its claim as the "Orthopedic Manufacturing Capital of the World" with expansions at four companies that already employ a combined 4,000 and are about to add another 260 new jobs, reports Joy McCarthy-Sessing, president of Kosciusko Development Inc.

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The county's top employer, Warsaw-headquartered Zimmer Inc., with 3,000 now on the payroll locally, is investing $19 million for a 50,000-square-foot addition to one of its existing facilities and plans to add another 100 employees by 2011. Zimmer designs, develops and produces orthopedic reconstructive, spinal and trauma devices, dental implants and related orthopedic surgical products.

Symmetry Medical, which makes orthopedic instruments, has announced a $6.2 million upgrade in machinery and site remodel. It operates two facilities in Kosciusko County, in Warsaw and Claypool. Now employing 575, the company is adding another 60.

In Pierceton, Paragon Medical is adding 20,000 square feet to its plant, where 400 employees make surgical cases and trays, surgical instrumentation and implantable devices.

Startup OrthoPediatrics Corp., which began operations in 2007 with 10 employees, has grown to 26 and plans to add 100 new jobs over the next three to five years. The company, which makes orthopedic items for children, has announced it will invest $5 million in either a facility addition or a new building and add new equipment, too.

Other orthopedic manufacturers "doing tine" in the county, McCarthy-Sessing says, are: DePuy Inc., a Johnson & Johnson Company employing nearly 1,300; Biomet Inc., now a private company with a workforce of more than 1,200; and Medtronic, with 540 on the payroll.

Marshall County also has its claim to the orthopedics industry with CSpine Inc., which last year built a $3 million, 4,000-square-foot facility in Plymouth to house its research-and-development and prototype operations. Its products are spinal orthopedic and dental devices. "They employ a handful so far, with plans to grow over five years to about 50 people," says Doug Anspach, executive director of the Plymouth Industrial Development Corp. and Plymouth Area Chamber of Commerce. CSpine is the first tenant in the...