BOSTON SCIENTIFIC MAKES ANTITRUST COMMITMENTS

Boston Scientific announced that it has made certain commitments to the Directorate-General for Competition of the European Commission as part of the European Commission's antitrust review of Boston Scientific's merger with Guidant.

Details of the commitments are currently confidential, but will become public when the European Commission completes its review and announces its decision. During European Commission reviews of proposed acquisitions, companies often make commitments to resolve potential antitrust issues identified by the European Commission. The existence of commitments extends the typical five-week European Commission review period to up to seven weeks, which means that the European Commission review of the Boston Scientific-Guidant transaction will now formally conclude no later than April 13, 2006.