Dry eye treatment company TearScience, which is considering plans for an initial public stock offering, now has a new chief financial officer.
The medical device company has promoted Nicole Wicker from vice president of finance to CFO. Wicker joined TearScience in 2008 and guided the Morrisville, North Carolina company through its $44.5 million series C round of fundraising in 2010, which brought on new investors Essex Woodlands Health Ventures, Investor Growth Capital and General Catalyst.
TearScience has developed technologies to both diagnose and treat evaporative dry eye. Dry eyes affect an estimated 100 million people globally. The vast majority of those patients experience evaporative dry eye, a condition in which the eye has an insufficient amount of the oils that prevent the tear film from evaporating. TearScience’s LipiFlow device uses a combination of heat and pressure to clear the obstructions that block the oil-producing glands.
The LipiFlow technology initially received U.S. Food and Drug Administration 510(k) clearance last year. Software and a hand-held unit that doctors use with the device received 510(k) clearance in February. The complete system unit is now being marketed to doctors in the United States and select global markets.
TearScience CEO Tim Willis said earlier this year that the company is considering an IPO and that the stock offering could be made overseas. He said an overseas public offering would offer the venture capital-backed company a better opportunity for liquidity. Wicker is a veteran of Ernst & Young. Before joining TearScience, her experience included financial work at companies such as marketing resource management software firm SmartPath and mobile commerce company Motricity (NASDAQ:MOTR). She helped guide both North Carolina technology companies to major financial milestones: an acquisition in the case of SmartPath and an IPO for Motricity. It’s a safe bet that Wicker is expected to lead TearScience toward those same goals as well.
