Medtronic Boosts Dividend, Adds To Buyback

Medtronic PLC said Friday that it will boost its dividend by 25% and add about $6 billion worth of authorization to its share-buyback program.

The medical-device maker said it will pay out a quarterly cash dividend of 38 cents a share on July 17, up from its previous dividend of 30.5 cents a share.

Medtronic said it will also buy back an additional 80 million shares, representing about 6% of its shares outstanding. At Thursday's closing price of $76.72 a share, the share repurchases would be valued at $6.14 billion. There is no specific time period associated with the plan.

Medtronic said it has bought back $8.3 billion of its own stock in the past five years.

Separately, Medtronic said it has bought cardiac mapping company CardioInsight Technologies Inc. in a deal valued at $93 million.

Medtronic in January closed on a deal to buy Covidien Plc, which combined two of the world's largest surgical-implant and hospital-supply companies. The deal involved Medtronic reincorporating from Minneapolis to Dublin, a so-called inversion deal that lowers the company's tax burden.