A medical device company producing electronically adjusted optical lenses is poised for national expansion, Safeguard’s chief financial officer Stephen Zarrilli said in a conference call discussing the Safeguard Scientifics’ (NYSE:SFE) fourth-quarter earnings.
The product — a lens that electronically adjusts to the wearer’s eyesight — is aimed at people suffering from presbyopia, a condition in which the lens of an eye loses its elasticity with age and makes it increasingly difficult to see nearby objects.
Safeguard has a 25 percent stake in Virginia-based PixelOptics. Its product, EmPower, allows users to electronically adjust the focus of its lenses, an innovation the company claims is the first in the prescription eye wear market in 50 years.
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During an analyst conference call, Zarrilli, who sits on the board of PixelOptics, said the company, which is part of an $82 billion market, is set for a nationwide and international expansion.
The premium progressive lens market is about 8.7 million pairs a year. “Our goal is to have a 20 to 30 percent market share, and at 20 percent that would be 1.7 million pairs per year that we would be selling. … The broader progressive lens market is 62 million pairs. Our goal would be to be somewhere between 2 percent to 5 percent of that marketplace, which would result in a similar number of pairs, roughly about 2 million pairs per year.”
According to a transcript of the call from Seeking Alpha, PixelOptics’s EmPower glasses are sold in 400 stores, mainly in the Southeast region of the country. Providing an outlook for 2012, Zarrilli said the company is set to expand westward and internationally.
“We expect 2012 to be a year in which Pixel begins to generate its early stage revenue, and we believe that Pixel … is positioned to move quickly into the expansion stage, if not the high-traction stage, as it works its way into 2013.”
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