Alcon Inc., an eye care company with more than 770 workers in Irvine, said it is buying Aliso Viejo startup LenSx Lasers Inc. for $362 million.
LenSx, a venture capital-backed company, makes lasers used to remove cataracts.
Buying LenSx is designed to help Alcon’s eye surgery customers improve cataract removal procedures, the company said in a statement.
Alcon, which is based in Switzerland, said it may pay up to $382.5 million, depending on whether LenSx hits revenue milestones and other conditions.
LenSx’s investors include Versant Venture Management LLC, which has an office in Newport Beach, SV Life Sciences, which has offices in San Francisco, Boston and London, and Interwest Partners, with offices in Menlo Park and Dallas.
Its founding team is the same group that founded IntraLase Corp., an Irvine maker of eye lasers that was bought in 2007 by Santa Ana-based Advanced Medical Optics Inc., which now is Abbott Medical Optics Inc.
LenSx received Food and Drug Administration clearance for use of its laser in cataract removal last September.
The deal for LenSx comes ahead of the expected takeover of Alcon, which is a unit of Switzerland’s Nestle SA, later this year by fellow Swiss company Novartis AG.
Novartis, a diversified healthcare company, has said it expects to close its buy of a majority stake in Alcon later this year.
