Second Sight Medical Products, Inc. (NASDAQ:EYES) ("Second Sight" or
"the Company"), a developer, manufacturer and marketer of implantable
visual prosthetics that provide some useful vision to blind patients,
today announced the appointment of Steven D. Okland Jr. to Commercial
Vice President, U.S. and Canada.
“Steve brings more than 25 years of expertise in the medical device
industry and proven sales and marketing leadership skills to Second
Sight,” said Will McGuire, President and CEO of Second Sight. “Steve’s
success in driving the growth of novel medical device technologies in
early stages of commercialization will be invaluable in achieving our
strategic goals. He has a proven track record of identifying talent and
developing sales and marketing teams, which make him the right leader to
advance our efforts to support existing and new implanting centers,”
added McGuire.
“Steve will be responsible for our commercialization efforts in the U.S.
and Canada, including sales, marketing, and customer service. With
Steve’s expertise, we look forward to building upon the progress we have
already made to expand the commercial presence of the Argus II Retinal
Prosthesis and ultimately address the eight million individuals blind
due to causes that today have no treatment,” concluded McGuire.
Mr. Okland joins Second Sight from Sanford Rose Associates – Okland
Group, Inc., where he served as President and specialized in commercial
executive talent acquisition for early stage to mid-cap size companies
in the medical device space. At Miramar Labs, Inc., a medical device
company focused on treating dermatologic medical conditions, he served
as Vice President, Worldwide Marketing and Sales, leading all
commercialization activities. At Medivance, Inc., Steve served as Vice
President, Worldwide Marketing and U.S. Sales and directed the
turnaround of all commercialization activities resulting in a $250M
acquisition by Bard Medical. At Spectranetics, Inc., as Vice President,
U.S. Sales and Marketing, he directed all U.S. sales and marketing
operations during a period when the company was named to Fortune’s 100
Fastest Growing Companies three years in a row. Steve also served as
Chief Operating Officer of a medical device start-up company, directing
and managing sales, marketing, R&D and manufacturing operations. He held
positions of increasing responsibility during twelve years at Boston
Scientific Corporation and at Johnson & Johnson Medical, Inc., where he
began his career. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the
University of Wisconsin and a Masters of Business Administration from
Texas Christian University.
About the Argus II® Retinal Prosthesis System
Second Sight's Argus II System provides electrical stimulation that
bypasses the defunct retinal cells and stimulates remaining viable cells
inducing visual perception in individuals with severe to profound
Retinitis Pigmentosa. The Argus II works by converting images captured
by a miniature video camera mounted on the patient's glasses into a
series of small electrical pulses, which are transmitted wirelessly to
an array of electrodes implanted on the surface of the retina. These
pulses are intended to stimulate the retina's remaining cells, resulting
in the perception of patterns of light in the brain. The patient then
learns to interpret these visual patterns, thereby regaining some visual
function. The Argus II is the first artificial retina to receive
widespread approval, and is offered at approved centers in Canada,
France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Switzerland,
Turkey, United Kingdom, and the U.S.
About Second Sight
Second Sight's mission is to develop, manufacture and market innovative
implantable visual prosthetics to enable blind individuals to achieve
greater independence. Second Sight has developed and manufactures the
Argus® II Retinal Prosthesis System. Enrollment is underway in a trial
to test the safety and utility of the Argus II in individuals with Dry
Age-Related Macular Degeneration. Second Sight is also developing the
Orion™ I Visual Cortical Prosthesis to restore some vision to
individuals who are blind due to causes other than preventable or
treatable conditions. U.S. Headquarters are in Sylmar, California, and
European Headquarters are in Lausanne, Switzerland. For more
information, visit www.secondsight.com.
Safe Harbor
This press release contains forward-looking statements within the
meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and
Section 21E of the Securities Exchange and Exchange Act of 1934, as
amended, which are intended to be covered by the "safe harbor" created
by those sections. All statements in this release that are not based on
historical fact are "forward looking statements." These statements may
be identified by words such as "estimates," "anticipates," "projects,"
"plans," or "planned," "seeks," "may," "will," "expects," "intends,"
"believes," "should," "potentially," "objectives," and similar
expressions or the negative versions thereof and which also may be
identified by their context. While management has based any forward
looking statements included in this release on its current expectations,
the information on which such expectations were based may change.
Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties
which could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the
forward-looking statements, as a result of various factors including
those risks and uncertainties described in the Risk Factors and in
Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results
of Operations sections of our Annual Report on Form 10-K as filed
on March 11, 2016 and our other reports filed from time to time with
the Securities and Exchange Commission. We urge you to consider those
risks and uncertainties in evaluating our forward-looking statements. We
caution readers not to place undue reliance upon any such
forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date made. Except
as otherwise required by the federal securities laws, we disclaim any
obligation or undertaking to publicly release any updates or revisions
to any forward-looking statement contained herein (or elsewhere) to
reflect any change in our expectations with regard thereto or any change
in events, conditions or circumstances on which any such statement is
based.
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