(c)2026 David Prutchi PhD
While documenting lesser-known implantable devices, I recently came across a pacemaker from a company that has largely vanished from the historical record: American Tech, Inc., based in Northridge, California.
American Tech, Inc. was a short-lived U.S. pacemaker manufacturer based in Northridge, California, active in the mid/late 1970s, that appears to have focused on the development of very small, compact implantable pacemakers for its time. Although the company has largely disappeared from the historical record, surviving devices such as the DU-15 pacemaker illustrate an early attempt to minimize implant size during a period of rapid technological change in cardiac pacing.
Contemporary regulatory summaries and Senate staff reports indicate that the company marketed several models under the DU-series and related product families. At least one clinical evaluation of the DU-15 was underway by the end of the decade, suggesting that implants were occurring by approximately 1978–1979.
Like several other small pacemaker manufacturers of that era, American Tech faced significant challenges. FDA advisories issued around 1979–1980 cited reliability concerns affecting multiple products from the company. By 1980, American Tech had withdrawn from the U.S. pacemaker market, and there is no evidence that its pacemaker business, or the company itself, was acquired by another manufacturer. Unlike some contemporaries, no successor firm assumed service or warranty responsibilities, suggesting that American Tech simply ceased operations.
American Tech, Inc. represents one of many small pacemaker manufacturers that briefly emerged during the late 1970s and disappeared as cardiac pacing technology matured and the industry consolidated. Its emphasis on miniaturization foreshadowed a design priority that would later become central to implantable pulse generator development.