The American company Second Sight Medical Products, thanks to its innovative eye implants, was able to partially restore vision to 350 blind patients, but since 2019, the production of bionic eyes has completely ceased, and by 2020 the manufacturer has practically suspended its activities, an information publication reported with reference to its sources. IEEE Spectrum. Accordingly, now all patients with the latest eye implants, which gave them hope to see at least something, were left in a rather precarious position, because if something happens to the device, then no one will simply be able to help.
At the moment, there is only one person in the world who decided to install two implants at once – his name is Terry Byland. In 2004, he installed the first model of the Argus I bionic eye, and 11 years later, in 2015, he decided to install a second implant on the other eye – by that time, the manufacturer had already introduced the Argus II model. As a result, the patient received a fairly advanced tool that allows him to see quite well, and the company received the necessary data for further development. And already in 2020, Terry learned that the manufacturer was on the verge of bankruptcy.
“Now I’m fine, but if something happens to the implant, I’m finished. After all, there is no chance to fix it, ”said Terry Byland.
Another patient named Ross Doerr received his Argus II implant in 2019 and was promised a software update in early 2020 to improve his overall vision. Unfortunately for Ross, the coronavirus pandemic was raging around the world at the time, so he had to wait a bit. And when he nevertheless called the doctor to sign up for a software update, he was informed that the entire staff was fired – there was simply no one to deal with the update. A very strange situation has occurred when a person cannot see better just because he has outdated firmware for a bionic eye installed – five years ago this seemed unthinkable.
The reason for this precarious situation is that Second Sight Medical Products had a weak IPO from the start, and shortly thereafter the company’s share price collapsed exactly four times. The manufacturer of innovative bionic eyes is on the verge of bankruptcy, announcing a possible merger with the pharmaceutical company Nano Precision Medical, which is engaged in a completely different direction and is not yet ready to assume obligations to support patients with bionic eyes.
Source: Trash Box
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