OIS Podcast Ep #367: A Fast, Fun Future, with Warren Foust and Magda Michna, PhD, Staar Surgical

Welcome to the Eye on Innovation Podcast, brought to you by OIS. I'm your host, Carrie Powers, and I have the incredible opportunity to interview amazing, smart people. It's the best job in the world, and today is no exception. My guests today are the newest additions to the STAAR Surgical leadership team. We have Warren Foust, who was named Chief Operating Officer just a few weeks ago, and Dr. Magda Michna, who was appointed Chief Clinical, Regulatory and Medical Affairs Officer for STAAR. First, we'll pause and say congratulations on these huge moves you just made, and welcome to OIS.

Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for having us.

Okay. Join Dr. Maria Barakall, Praveen Dougal, and Farash for Hall at the upcoming OIS Retina on July 27th in Seattle, where you'll see and meet with leading startup companies, top industry executives, and clinical thought leaders addressing unmet retina needs through novel therapies. Save 30% when you register for both OIS Retina and OIS-13, the original Ophthalmology Innovation Summit, taking place this December 1st and 2nd in San Diego. Register today at ois.net.

So, I just want to say, I've already shared this with Magda previously, but when the news came out that you guys made the move to STAAR, I woke up to it that morning and I was like, whoa. The text messages that were flying around, there's just so much energy right now and so much heart for STAAR. With Tom coming in recently as well, bringing you guys, I think you guys just have a lot of momentum right now, and everybody in the industry is rooting for you. So it's really fun to watch.

Great. So for listeners, both Warren and Magda were recently on another amazing iCare podcast called Illuminaries on the Healio Network. Host John Hovanesian and Jim Maze, they do an amazing job. Go listen to it. It's a really great foundational learning about Warren and Magda and their new roles. So we're certainly not going to do a repeat of that discussion, but just go maybe another layer deeper on some of the things you guys talked about there. So Warren, I'd like to start by talking about the unprecedented investment that STAAR has made in DTC. First, huge investment in terms of refractive surgical technology. So I'd love to hear from you: can we expect to see more of that now that you've seen some impact of the campaign? How is STAAR viewing DTC in the future?

It's a great question. And first of all, just thanks for having us. We're so excited to be here. You said at the beginning amazing and talented, which is what Magda is, and so that's part of how I got to STAAR. And thanks for the shout out about Dr. Hovanesian and Jim. That was kind of our hazing, I think, as we came into this. It was a great job. I loved it. So much fun. Listen to it twice. They're so great and have been so welcoming to us. And so that's one thing I know we both share: we love the ophthalmic community. So thank you for having us. Look, on DTC, I'm so excited because this is really the only company that's providing this avenue by which we're trying to help our refractive surgeons grow their practices. And DTC advertising is expensive and it's complicated. We have an amazing group of marketers who have done a great job under the leadership of David Kormanski to guide us there and make sure that we're using dollars in the right way. But what we've seen is on a national level, not just in the US, by the way, national level in China where we started with DTC marketing, and everyone I think understands the success that we've had in China, which is great. We want to emulate that now in the US as we've done in other markets around the world. And what we see is when we turn a market on, we have incredible adoption. Patients are coming into physicians' practices and saying, 'I want an EVO ICL in my eye.' And then after they get it, when the surgeon makes that decision, we see 99.4% patient satisfaction, which we're really proud of. I saw that at ASCRS the other day. That's just phenomenal. And the physicians out in the community, they've even mentioned to me how excited they were at the celebrity brand influencers that you guys brought on board. So there is a lot of appreciation.

And do I have it right that you guys don't have an outside agency but you're handling all this in-house?

That's right. We're handling it in-house, and we're proud of the fact that we have the talent in-house to do it. And so we've had amazing campaigns. The Nick Jonas campaign, I think, was really important, but now we've just signed, and we had the press release on Thursday, all three Jonas Brothers are now going to be engaged with us as we're supporting their tour, which is going to kick off out of New York in August. And so much more to come from a direct-to-consumer advertising perspective. We love it. Our customers are telling us they love it. I had a customer come and hug me today to say thank you for trying to drive patients and to be in a company that's going to drive patients for their refractive practice. A happy EVO ICL patient makes a happy surgeon and grows a surgeon's refractive practice.

Absolutely. I don't want to harp too much on DTC, obviously that's my wheelhouse, but I just think the wheels are turning here. I think it's so unique that you guys are doing that in-house. And as a marketer and someone who has spent a lot of money with agencies in the past, what I love about that is the alignment. Your team is 100% aligned with STAAR's business objectives as opposed to their own. So I just think that's really commendable.

Yeah, we'll tell the team. They're amazing. So thank you.

Yeah, absolutely. So Magda, you've mentioned in the past how critical it is to provide physicians with the information they need to be able to educate their patients. So I really want to hear from you more on that and your plans to partner with physicians to be able to bring that service forward.

Fantastic. So Magda, I understand that in your new role, you're actually uniting three different previously separate organizations at STAAR. So talk to us about the synergies that the organization saw with doing that and what your approach is going to be.

I love that. Your experience, Magda, is just perfect for this challenge that you have ahead of you. So that's fantastic.

Warren, one of the topics that you mentioned on the Illuminaries podcast was the great opportunities for physician partnership. So I was really intrigued by that. I'd love to hear more about how you're approaching that.

Yeah, it's a great question. And look, we've had tremendous success outside the US. I mentioned China before. China is a little bit of a different type of customer than the very, very segregated in many ways customer that exists in the United States from a standpoint of independent practices that may operate very differently than a big system like IRE. And in China, with that said, we also have big private equity groups and venture capital max situations we need to address differently than we might an individual woman or man that's practicing in Cincinnati, for example. So what we're trying to do is customize solutions for each one of those types of customers that can engage with us. And so we're really happy that we have programs. The best way to access that is to reach out to local leadership and talk about what would be specific to a customer's needs. For example, someone who wants to start with EVO ICL, we have programs where we can do a fast start and get them up to speed, one from a training perspective because it's important. We want to make sure that we train the surgeons so that they can deliver the best outcome for their patients. So we take a lot of time and care to do that. But we're also interested in partnering with that physician as they solve for needs that might be in their practice. Maybe they're going into an office-based setting where they want to operate in their office. We can in some ways assist with that. We can in some ways have opportunities to help educate their potential customers or potential patients. And so again, we customize those for each one of our different surgeons, but we're excited about delivering that to them.

It's so nice to be in a situation where it's 100% cash pay, so that kind of opens the door to partnering in a way that's right.

And look, if we do it right, we have these national campaigns. And so I mentioned the Jonas Brothers, and there are others too. We have social media marketers that are helping drive traffic to these customers. And that, assuming that there's a certain volume commitment, then we'll ask for a volume commitment because we believe that the technology warrants it. Then we have, at that next level, at the more local level, the ability to partner with customers, and they love it.

Yeah, really great feedback in the marketplace right now about what STAAR is doing. So now I'd like to switch gears just a little bit and put your personal hat on for a moment. With just making these big career moves that you've just made, I'm sure there was a lot of self-reflection that went on to make a big decision like this. So I just want to hear kind of how you approach that decision, what made you finally pull the trigger to make a big move, and how are you thinking about your future in terms of development and your leadership legacy? So Magda, let's start with you.

Absolutely. That's such a good point. There tends to be a lot of flash sometimes on the commercial side, when our medical, clinical, R&D colleagues are 100% just as responsible for everything that we're doing. So that's fantastic. And I really do see that as an extension of the legacy you already have in our industry for mentoring and leading the next generation. So thank you.

Absolutely. Warren, I'd love to hear from you on this subject too.

Yeah, look, I love what Magda said. And you talk about reflection. We had a chance to go to Monrovia together and see the manufacturing facility up there. If you haven't been in the car with me, I normally have a seven and nine year old in the back of the car, getting in traffic in LA. We're lucky to be alive. That's a true story. But look, first of all, my wife Stacy and I, we anguished over the decision. I love the time that I spent at Johnson & Johnson, an amazing company filled with incredibly talented, lovely people that are my family in a lot of ways. And so taking this step outside to come to a place like STAAR was hard from that perspective, but it was easy from the standpoint of STAAR is an amazing company. What has been built before us, absolutely the challenges that they've gone through since 1982 to get us to where we are now, it's spectacular. So I'm so excited just to be part of an organization that has endured all of that and has now put themselves on this trajectory for explosive growth. And I'm talking growth outside the US already documented in the public domain of 20 plus percent, but at market levels we're growing double digits in every market, in some cases double. And so it's just exciting. The people are talented, they're committed. When I had a chance to see that, it was obvious. It's a fun place to work. It's one of our values. We sat down as a leadership team, we aligned on some values: empowerment of our people, driving a fast sense of execution, so we want to do things fast, and fun was one of them. We have others, but I just don't want to leave that piece out because I think where you work and who you work with is important. So 100%, that's everything.

Yeah, that's fantastic. I love it that fun actually made it into your core values. That's fantastic. Well, congratulations again. Like I said before, the whole industry is rallying around you guys right now. So very excited to see what you guys do. And thank you again. I know this has to be one of the most busy meetings of the entire year, and the fact that I got both of you at the same time was just fantastic. So thank you from the bottom of my heart for making time for the OIS podcast.

You're welcome. Thanks for having us. And thanks for all that OIS does. And looking forward to seeing you again soon.

Thank you so much. OIS, fantastic. Thank you both.