Medical meetings have been one of the cornerstones of Puerto Rico's meetings business, and with the new Puerto Rico Convention Center in San Juan, the destination will be able to pursue more and larger medical meetings, said Ana Maria Viscasillas, president and CEO, Puerto Rico Convention Bureau, during the November opening ceremonies for the new venue.

It took four years and $415 million to transform an old Navy base into a convention center that offers 580,000 square feet of meeting and exhibit space. It is the largest meeting facility in Latin America and the Caribbean. Medical associations that have already booked the new center include the Association for Molecular Pathology and the International Society of Hematology.

With offices of more than 50 leading pharmaceutical, biotech, and medical-device manufacturers on the island, including Amgen, Eli Lilly, Abbott Labs, Pfizer, Baxter, Merck, Roche, and Medtronics, and more growth on the way, Puerto Rico is a hotbed for corporate medical meetings as well. About 40 percent of the island's meeting business is corporate, with much of it medical. Puerto Rico is one of the leading manufacturers of medical products: 25 percent of the world's pharmaceutical products are manufactured on the island; and the island exports $37 billion annually in life sciences products.