Republican U.S. Senate candidate and former Indiana Senator Dan Coats toured Biomet in Warsaw Friday afternoon.
Coats (R-Fort Wayne), who previously served as Indiana's senator from 1989-1999, faces Democrat Brad Ellsworth, Evansville, in the Nov. 2 election.
Dr. Dane Miller, Biomet founder and director and former CEO, said Coats' campaign contacted him two months ago to see if he was interested in Coats learning about Biomet's operations.
Coats met with members of Biomet's management team, and received a tour by Miller and Bill Kolter, Biomet corporate vice president of government and public affairs and corporate communication, Friday afternoon.
Miller said he wanted Coats to learn about things in Washington that are impairments to Biomet's continued success as an orthopedic company, such as the medical device tax.
Miller said if Coats is elected as senator he will represent this state and a sizable medical device industry not only in Warsaw, but also in and Bloomington and Indianapolis.
"As our population ages we need to come up with innovative ways to treat more people," said Miller.
The Times-Union had an opportunity prior to the tour to ask Coats questions about the orthopedic industry, job creation and his run for senate.
Coats said he has been familiar with Biomet and Miller for a long time, and said while serving as a senator he represented Biomet.
"I am well acquainted with Biomet and they are one of the leading industries in Indiana and in the world, and I am here because I want to see how they are coping with this current recession that we are in," Coats said.
He said the orthopedic industry is employing a lot of people and developing state-of-the-art products that are sold in the U.S. and overseas.
However, a medical device tax is being levied on them because they are being successful, he said.
"It is absolutely the wrong signal to send to business, and we need to get people back to work in Indiana," Coats said.
Coats' opponent, Ellsworth, has referred to Coats as a lobbyist and Coats was asked to comment on that.
"I think my opponent wants to acknowledge that he is a sitting congressman in Washington, but doesn't want to talk about voting along with Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi 90 percent of the time," Coats said. "If I had voted for things he voted for I wouldn't want to talk about them either."
Coats talked about job creation and said there needs to be a different formula for getting the economy back on track.
"What has been pushed out by this administration has not worked, and the economy is just as bad as it was when we started and unemployment levels are high," Coats said.He said there needs to be job incentives and taxes don't need to be raised in a recession.
"All the things this administration has talked about doing has frozen business, and adding costs to businesses and making it uncertain in terms of hiring people and purchasing new equipment," Coats said.
