Eyeonics Inc. got its start thanks to a well-timed meeting on the deck of the Hotel Laguna.
The Aliso Viejo-based company, which makes replacement lenses for cataract patients, was founded by J. Andy Corley and Dr. Stuart Cumming. The duo met in the late 1990s when Cumming was short on cash and needed Corley to help fund his invention.
The pair were honored at last week’s Excellence in Entrepreneurship Awards luncheon put on by the Business Journal.
Crystalens, Eyeonics’ signature product, is an implantable intraocular lens designed to provide “natural vision” to a patient after cataract surgery.
Crystalens, which has regulatory approval, uses the eye’s muscle to move the lens back and forth in a natural manner. The lens allows wearers to have less dependence on corrective lenses or eyeglasses, according to the company.
Cumming, Eyeonics’ chief scientific officer, spent nine years developing Crystalens in his Emerald Bay basement. But he was on the verge of running out of money in late 1997 when he and Corley hooked up.
“It’s a real great story about persistence,” said Corley, Eyeonics’ chairman and chief executive. “Most people would have quit,(Cumming) spent a lot of money and had a lot of failure. But he stuck with it.”
When Cumming was running out of money, Corley was cashing in. He had just sold Chiron Ophthalmics, a developer of laser eye surgery devices that he cofounded, to Bausch & Lomb Inc. of Rochester, N.Y.
“I was just wondering what I was going to do,” said Corley, who had spent part of his career at Allergan Inc., the Irvine-based drug maker.
“I picked up the phone, called him and said, ‘Hey, how’s the project?'” Corley said. “He was about ready to quit, so I met him on the deck of the Hotel Laguna.”
After Eyeonics was founded, the duo struggled to keep the company going until it attracted venture capital.
“We went through the classic stuff,first year, no salary,” Corley said.
Eyeonics, which sells to eye surgeons, has raised $27 million of venture funding. William Link, a longtime Orange County venture capital investor who is a managing director of Versant Ventures, was Eyeonics’ first investor. Link made the investment through Brentwood Venture Capital, another firm he was involved with.
“Bill Link was my old boss at Allergan,” said Corley, who held sales and marketing positions at the company. “It’s partly a Stuart and Andy story, but it’s a Bill Link story, too.”
Eyeonics posted about $13 million in sales last year. Corley said the company is “teetering on profitability.” It has 100 workers, including 80 full-time workers.
The Crystalens devices are made in Rancho Cucamonga.
Tiny Eyeonics has to deal with some established, well-funded competitors. Besides Bausch & Lomb, rivals include Santa Ana-based Advanced Medical Optics Inc. and Alcon Laboratories Inc., a Nestle SA unit with a large operation in Irvine.
Eyeonics isn’t looking to be acquired by any of the lens leaders at this time, Corley said. The cataract lens market is mature, he said.
So Eyeonics chose to take the “hard route” and convince surgeons and patients of Crystalens’ value, Corley said. The devices cost more than other products made in high volume.
Eyeonics previously was known as C & C; Vision Inc. The company changed its name to Eyeonics in 2003.
