Corporate Governance

Ms. Mason was elected to STAAR’s Board of Directors at its 2014 Annual Meeting, and she has served as STAAR’s Chief Executive Officer since March 1, 2015. From 2010 to 2012, Ms. Mason served as Chief Executive Officer of Verinata Health, Inc. (f/k/a Artemis Health, Inc.), a provider of non-invasive prenatal genetic sequencing tests for the early identification of fetal chromosomal abnormalities. In February 2013, Verinata was acquired by Illumina. Ms. Mason served as the President, Chief Executive Officer and a Director of Quidel Corporation from 2004 to 2009, a publicly traded company engaged in the development, manufacturing and marketing of rapid diagnostic solutions at the professional point of care in infectious diseases and reproductive health. Prior to joining Quidel, Ms. Mason provided consultative services from 2003 to 2004 for Eastman Kodak Health Imaging as a result of the sale of MiraMedica, Inc., to Eastman Kodak. She served as President and Chief Executive Officer for MiraMedica, Inc., an early phase start-up developing computer aided detection software for breast cancer, from 2002 through 2003. Prior to her tenure with MiraMedica, Inc., Ms. Mason served as Chief Executive Officer of eMed Technologies of Lexington, Massachusetts, a teleradiology and picture archiving and communications systems business. Ms. Mason served as General Manager of the Women’s Healthcare business and as a General Manager in various capacities for the Services business of General Electric Healthcare from 1996 to 2000. Ms. Mason’s additional healthcare experience includes her tenure with Bayer AG/AGFA from 1989 to 1996 where she last held the positions of Senior Vice President for Bayer Corporate Health Care and Senior Vice President for the AGFA Technical Imaging Business Group. Ms. Mason began her career in healthcare with American Hospital Supply/Baxter Healthcare in sales, marketing and managerial roles from 1977 through 1988. Ms. Mason received her B.A. from Indiana University. Ms. Mason’s prior corporate governance experience includes both private and public boards with Verinata Health, eMed Technologies, MiraMedica and Quidel Corporation. She currently serves as a director on the Board of The Medical Device Manufacturers Association, MDMA, a medical device trade association headquartered in Washington, D.C., and on the Advisory Board for InDevR, Inc., a biotechnology company in Boulder, Colorado developing diagnostic and vaccine technologies. Ms. Mason also serves on the Board of Directors of the ASCRS Foundation and the ICO Foundation, both of which are global nonprofit organizations focused on humanitarian eye care and education.

Mr. Williams was appointed Chief Financial Officer in July 2020. From 2016 to 2019, he served as the Chief Financial Officer of Sientra, Inc. before transitioning to General Manager for its miraDry® business unit. Prior to that, from 2012 to 2016, Mr. Williams served as Chief Financial Officer of ZELTIQ Aesthetics, Inc., a publicly-traded medical device company that was acquired by Allergan. Previously, Mr. Williams served as Vice President in finance, strategy and investor relations roles from 2007 to 2012 at NuVasive, Inc., a San-Diego based medical device company. He has also held finance roles with Callaway Golf and Kyocera Wireless. Mr. Williams received an MBA in Finance and Management from San Diego State University and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the University of California, San Diego.

Dr. Scott Barnes joined STAAR in October 2017 as Chief Medical Officer.

Dr. Barnes comes to STAAR after a distinguished 30-year career with the military, retiring at the rank of Colonel. Since 2004, Dr. Barnes has served as Chief of Ophthalmology Services, Womack Army Medical Center, Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Soon after he joined Womack, he was asked to serve as the theater ophthalmology consultant and surgeon in Iraq and Afghanistan during 2005. In 2006, he returned to Womack as Chief of Refractive Surgery and helped to establish the use of ICLs in the Army. In 2008, Colonel Barnes was awarded the Army Surgeon General's A designator, similar to the level of professor at a civilian institution. Dr. Barnes began his medical career in 1986 as a research assistant in the Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School/Children's Hospital in Boston and in 1991 became a general surgery intern at William Beaumont Army Medical Center. He went on to become a Special Forces (“Green Beret”) Battalion and Group Surgeon as well as the Deputy Surgeon for the US Army Special Operations Command. He completed an ophthalmology residency at the Wilford Hall/Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas in 1998. Colonel Barnes held numerous ophthalmology positions at a number of military bases and was asked to serve as the Deputy Commander for Clinical Services for all combat trauma, medical, veterinary, and dental care in Afghanistan during a 13-month deployment in 2011-2012. Under Colonel Barnes’ direction at Fort Bragg, more than 3,000 ICLs have been implanted in the eyes of our nation's servicemen and women. Dr. Barnes has given more than 200 presentations and lectures as well as led over 30 ophthalmology or refractive surgery research projects. He has been awarded Speaker of the Day at the Royal Hawaiian Eye Meeting ten times as well as numerous other awards and honors at industry meetings.

In addition to earning his Bachelor of Arts degree from Wheaton College, and his doctorate degree from Northwestern University Medical School in Chicago, Dr. Barnes' post-doctoral training includes a Cornea Fellowship at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary/Harvard Medical School in Boston.

Mr. Blickensdoerfer, who joined STAAR in January 2005, has over 20 years’ experience in the ophthalmic device industry. Initially, he served as STAAR’s Vice President, International Marketing from 2005 to 2010, then from 2011 through 2015 he served as President, Europe, Middle East, Africa and Latin America. In 2016, he became Senior Vice President, Commercial Operations for Europe, Middle East, Africa, Latin America and China. In 2017, he became Senior Vice President, Commercial Operations for Direct Markets, Europe, and China. Prior to joining STAAR, Mr. Blickensdoerfer served from January 2003 through December 2004 as Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Milvella Ltd., an Australia-based medical device maker, where his duties included both regional and worldwide business planning, product launches and management of European clinical studies. He worked from 2000 through 2002 for Novartis-CIBA Vision, an ophthalmic surgical company, as the Commercial Director for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Between 1997 and early 2000 he worked for the Ophthalmic Surgical Division of Bausch & Lomb, Inc. as its Area Sales Manager for Central and Eastern Europe. Prior to that time, he worked in sales and product management positions in the Ophthalmic Surgical Division of Chiron Vision and at Chiron Adatomed GmbH. Mr. Blickensdoerfer received his diploma in Marketing and International Management from the University of Mannheim in Germany. He is based in our Nidau, Switzerland facility.

Mr. Francese has 22 years of experience in ophthalmology, including 14 years marketing surgical products with Abbott Medical Optics (AMO), formerly Advanced Medical Optics and Allergan. During his time at AMO from 1990 to 2012, Mr. Francese held several positions of executive level responsibilities, including Head of Marketing, Americas for all surgical, refractive and corneal products, Head of Global Corneal Marketing responsible for all consumer products, and V.P. of Asia Pacific Region where he had full financial responsibility for cataract and refractive product lines during his tenure. He received his B.S. from Cornell University, M.S. from the University of Washington and M.B.A. from the University of Southern California.

Mr. Gesten joined STAAR in April 2012 as Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary. In May 2014, he assumed the role Vice President of Business Development and Chief Legal Officer. In addition to his roles as Chief Legal Officer and Secretary, Mr. Gesten serves as Chief Compliance Officer. From 2009 through 2011, he served as Executive Vice President, General Counsel and as a member of the Executive Committee of Allergan, Inc. Prior to that, he spent 11 years at Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. in a variety of positions, including General Counsel and Assistant Secretary of the Laboratory Products Group and Vice President, Deputy General Counsel. Prior to his work at Thermo Fisher, Mr. Gesten spent 11 years practicing law. He holds a B.A. in Economics from Brandeis University and a J.D. from Boston University.

Mr. Goodmen joined STAAR in August 2010. Prior to joining STAAR, he served as Vice President, Business Development for Neovia Integrated Insurance Services, a healthcare brokerage firm, from 2009 to 2010. His prior experience also includes seven years at THQ, Inc., a developer of interactive entertainment software where he served as Executive Vice President of Human Resources and Administration from 2002 to 2009. During this time period, he was responsible for all Human Resources and general administrative functions worldwide. Additional experience includes senior management positions in Human Resources at Liberty Livewire and in executive search with Spencer Stuart. He began his human resources career at Atlantic Richfield Co., a Fortune 500 energy company, where he spent 18 years. Mr. Goodmen earned a B.A. from Colgate University and a M.S. from Syracuse University.

Dr. Jon K. Hayashida joined STAAR in July 2015 as Vice President of Global Clinical and Medical Affairs. Over the past 30 years, Dr. Hayashida's professional career includes experience in corporate eye care, ophthalmic start-up companies and direct patient care. From 2010 to 2013 he held the position of Vice President of Clinical and Medical Affairs for Bausch and Lomb, Surgical, where he gained FDA approvals for both the Glistening-free enVista Hydrophobic Acrylic IOL and PMA approval for the Trulign Toric Accommodating IOL. He also held Clinical Affairs leadership and research positions with Cooper Vision and Allergan. His Ophthalmic start-up company experience includes Vice President Clinical Affairs for Wavetec Vision, Transcend Medical and Refractec where he directed, planned and executed successful FDA PMA approvals. Dr. Hayashida has served as a clinical care specialist at the UCLA Laser Refractive Center, Jules Stein Institute, UCLA School of Medicine. Most recently, from 2013 to 2015, he served as Vice President of Programs and Services for the Braille Institute of America. He earned his Bachelor of Science and Doctorate of Optometry from Southern California College of Optometry. Dr. Hayashida is a Fellow of the American Academy of Optometry and a Diplomate in its Cornea and Contact Lens and Refractive Technologies Section.

Dr. Keith Holliday joined STAAR in August 2015 as Vice President of Research and Development. In March 2017, he assumed the role of the Chief Technology Officer. From 2007 to his arrival at STAAR, he served as Vice President, Research and Development at ReVision Optics where he oversaw the development of their corneal inlay technology that includes a hydrogel inlay for presbyopia correction, delivery devices and clinical methodologies as well as managing first-in-man clinical studies. Previously, he was Director of Laser Technology at Advanced Medical Optics (AMO) and Staff Laser Scientist at VISX. Prior to joining VISX, Dr. Holliday worked primarily in academia. He obtained his first degree in Physics and Electronics from the University of Saint Andrews in Scotland and a Ph.D. from the Laser Physics Centre at the Australian National University. He spent three years at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, where he was primarily involved with the utilization of optically active polymers and crystals, to develop materials and techniques for very high density, holographic optical storage and computational systems. Dr. Holliday holds patents in excimer laser beam detection, control and profiling, and methods to correct presbyopia that synergistically take into account the epithelium’s response to corneal inlays, and he has also authored 37 peer reviewed publications in the scientific literature plus two book chapters and one single-authored book. He is considered an expert on presbyopia and served as a committee member for the International Society of Presbyopia.

Ms. McEachern has served as Global Head of Regulatory Affairs and Quality Assurance since December 2014. Previously, she served as Vice President Global Regulatory Affairs at Bausch & Lomb, Inc. from 2008 through 2013. Before that, she served in a variety of Regulatory Affairs and Quality Assurance senior management roles at Vistakon and LifeScan, Inc., Johnson and Johnson subsidiaries, from 1992 through 2008. McEachern is RAC certified, and was inducted as a Fellow in the Regulatory Affairs Professional Society in 2013. She earned an Executive Juris Doctor from Concord Law School in 2011, and received a B.S. in Biology with a minor in Chemistry from Washington College in 1980.

Mr. Subrin joined STAAR Surgical AG, our subsidiary in Nidau, Switzerland in January 2002 and served as Vice President, Switzerland Operations. He moved to the Monrovia facility in July 2014 and is responsible for ICL Manufacturing. Previously, he has held senior manufacturing positions at Bausch & Lomb, one of the largest surgical ophthalmic companies, and Domilens in France. In 1995, he was Manufacturing Manager at Bausch & Lomb in Lyons, France and responsible for the company’s intraocular lens (IOL) manufacturing line. While working at Bausch & Lomb in Florida, Philippe focused on process improvements and development for their 3 piece silicone IOL. Mr. Subrin earned a degree in Optometry from the University of Morez in France and also a degree in Engineering and Operational Management from the University of Lyon in Lyon, France.