The industry is banding together to celebrate a major milestone since Sir Harold Ridley famously implanted the first IOL. With the lens manufactured by Rayner, CEO TIM CLOVER discusses honouring Ridley’s legacy and how the company continues to innovate alongside inventor surgeons.
Over the course of its 114-year history, intraocular lens (IOL) manufacturer Rayner has had a direct hand in sculpting modern-day cataract surgery. Today, it is celebrating the part it played in arguably one of modern medicine’s most important advancements – as this year marks the 75th anniversary of the first IOL implanted by Sir Harold Ridley.
The lens was manufactured by Rayner at its workshop in Brighton, East Sussex, UK, and implanted in a 45-year-old woman at St Thomas’ Hospital in London on 29 November 1949.
Mr Tim Clover, who took the reigns as Rayner’s CEO in 2014, says the IOL is one of the health industry’s most important inventions – with hundreds of millions of eyes treated since the mid 20th century.
“Giving someone their sight back has overwhelming emotional and economic benefits that are very hard to compare to other procedures,” he says. “In my mind, it has been the most amazing advancement in medical science which continues to this day.”
The IOL story begins with Sir Ridley who was working at Moorfields Eye Hospital in London during World War II and treating air force casualties with shards of plastic from the Spitfire cockpit lodged in their eye. Curiously, he noticed they did not suffer any inflammation.
From there, he and Rayner’s optical engineer Mr John Pike designed the first IOL –manufactured by Rayner – in the back of Ridley’s Rolls Royce, parked around the corner from Moorfields.
This marked the first of many collaborations between Rayner and experts that would help define cataract surgery, as it is known today, including big names such as world-renowned Western Australian ophthalmologist Professor Graham Barrett.
Since its conception, Rayner’s research and development has been the heart of its operations. So, when Clover was appointed as CEO, he closed the business’ retail optometry business and established a state-of-the-art manufacturing centre on the UK’s south coast with significant investment in R&D.
“We did that with the intention to focus entirely on cataract surgery and to re-discover our entrepreneurial and innovative beginnings,” Clover says.
The current market for IOLs is a behemoth, with more than 30 million IOLs implanted annually. As such, it is a vital market for new discoveries to challenge cataract surgeons and take patient care to new heights.
However, a market dominated by a handful of players can stifle innovation so – to not let potential advancements slip by – Rayner plays a unique role in fostering new ideas and providing a platform for critical research. The company is embedded in ophthalmology, helping to bridge the gap between the operating room and lab.
“We have become the partner of choice for inventor surgeons who have great ideas that should be brought to market. And often, we are the primary route to market for them,” Clover says.
Rayner has positioned itself this way, according to Clover, due to the organic R&D structure in place. Not only does it have a dedicated, internal R&D team, but the company’s differentiating factor is the magnitude of external collaborations with both individual surgeons and institutions.
Clover says with 14 product launches in the last seven years, this exemplifies the R&D roots of the company, and echoes the days of Ridley, where a company and surgeon work together to create something “revolutionary”. Among the most pivotal collaborations is helping establish the David J Apple Laboratory in Heidelberg, Germany.
“Dr Apple was partly responsible for designing the edge of the lens which we still use today. And that gives our product some very specific characteristics which makes it attractive to surgeons,” Clover says.
Other important collaborations include that with Professor Michael Amon, a Swiss surgeon, who designed an entirely new type of lens to be implanted in the sulcus, as opposed to the anterior chamber.
More recently, Prof Barrett and Rayner launched the RayOne EMV extending range of vision IOL. Harnessing positive spherical aberration, he spent many years working to bring his concept to market before finding a home in Rayner. In a recent interview with Insight, Prof Barrett had particularly high praise for Clover and the way in which the Rayner respected the essence of his design.
“Graham’s EMV lens is our fastest growing and most important lens today,” Clover adds. “And that came homegrown from Australia.”
A new era
In January 2024, the acquisition of This Ag, the manufacturer of Sophi phaco emulsification machines, heralded a new era in Rayner’s global growth. Through the purchasing of adjacent technologies, Clover says this complements Rayner’s expanding cataract surgery portfolio.
Sophi is a completely cable-free system, with advanced features that provide mobility, simplicity, and safety within the operating theatre.
“It’s a standout system. With its styling and technology, it was always the go to product, and an obvious link for Rayner,” Clover says.
Outside of acquisitions, Rayner is consolidating its global footprint by establishing direct commercial operations in countries around the world, including Australia in 2022. Operations have been set up in Sydney and led by country manager Ms Lisa Farquhar.
“This way, we’re able to have a closer, and better relationship with local surgeons,” Clover says.
As an important market with an accessible and high-quality regulatory affairs regime, having a direct presence in Australia for Rayner was an obvious decision. On-ground local knowledge of the Australian market dynamics enables the company to receive immediate feedback to surgeons, which Farquhar says has been at the forefront of Rayner growth within Australia.
“Australian ophthalmologists are early adopters of technologies and are among the most widely travelled and well respected in the world,” Farquhar says.
She says that a direct presence in Australia has enabled the company to focus on its relationship with surgeons and their staff to support the rollout of bespoke new technologies for best patient outcomes.
“We are known to take on surgeon opinion which is increasing our recognition as an innovative brand and agile company in the marketplace,” Farquhar says.
Clover adds: “The premium technology is valued and embraced over there. Australian surgeons want to be at the forefront. So, they adopt that technology very readily, which is a good fit for us.”
Past, present and future
Just as it has had a hand in shaping the past and present of cataract surgery, Rayner hopes to have a hand in shaping its trajectory.
Clover says the company is driven by patient satisfaction – he wants to remove outliers and see near 100% patient satisfaction.
“The dissatisfaction comes from the complicated nature of the IOLs: they contain complicated diffractive structures that split light. This can come with a huge toll on productivity and time of surgery, among other things,” he says.
Hence, the company is exploring new territory. Armed with artificial intelligence, Rayner intends to develop novel optics that mitigate these issues and augment patient satisfaction.
Beyond technology, Rayner can be considered a pioneer in environmentalism with feats including a recycling plant for isopropyl alcohol.
It’s also reduced single-use plastic in products by 60% with updated packaging that eliminates traditional paper instructions and replaces the plastic tray and lid container with a flexible sterility pouch.
“This means you can put twice as many in the autoclave which means you need 30% less energy to sterilise them than you would normally,” Clover says.
This environmentalism played a major role in Rayner’s decision to acquire the Sophi system.
“Sophi has a cassette where all the bodily fluids go. And most companies expect surgeons to change those in between each patient. But the Sophi has a clever mechanism which is patented, which means it’s clean and can be used for up to 10 patients at a time,” Clover says.
Celebrating Rayner
The 75th anniversary of the first IOL implant is being appropriately commemorated later this year, with the industry banding together at the United Kingdom and Ireland Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons (UKISCRS) 48th Annual Congress in November 2024.
Organised by Rayner in conjunction with the Ridley Eye Foundation, the world’s leading cataract and refractive surgeons will congregate in the Tower of London to firstly commemorate the history of the IOL, and then discuss the technological horizon.
“It’s such a nice story and it certainly deserves to be told through history. Hopefully, this is a little bit of a contribution to keeping the awareness going,” Clover says.
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