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Howmedica Rutherford Howmedica is honored for six decades of leadership in development of orthopedic products that help people around the world enjoy longer, healthier and more productive lives. As a business of the Medical Technology group of Pfizer, Inc. Howmedica designs and manufactures a broad range of orthopedic reconstructive implants such as hip- and knee-joint replacements, internal and external bone-fixation devices and trauma products. Since the company's founding in 1936, Howmedica has worked in close cooperation with some of the most creative minds in the worldwide orthopedic community. Drawing also on its own recognized design resources, Howmedica has successfully addressed a multitude of orthopedic problems through the application of advanced technologies to restore mobility and quality of life to patients whose bones and joints have been damaged by disease or accident. Howmedica is best known for the development of a cobalt-chrome-molybdenum alloy, known by the trademark Vitallium® Alloy - the key material for an estimated four million joint replacements to date. No other orthopedic implant material has been so thoroughly researched of widely documented as Vitallium®. Today, Howmedica continues to work with orthopedic surgeons, hospitals, teaching institutions and administrators to develop and manufacture better, more advanced products for greater numbers of people and conditions around the world. Recently, Howmedica researchers have been pioneering in the development of new polyethelene surfaces to extend the utility of reconstructive implants.