Announcement • May 30
Oculis Holding AG Announces Board and Committee Appointments
Oculis Holding AG at its AGM held on May 29, 2024, announced Robert K. Warner and Arshad M. Khanani were elected as members of the Board of Directors. Robert K. Warner was elected as members of the Compensation Committee, Baruch D. Kuppermann, M.D., Ph.D. and Frank G. Holz, M.D., Ph.D.as members of its Scientific Advisory Board. Robert K. Warner was a member of the Alcon Executive Leadership Team for over 10 years and led the Alcon transition from Nestle to Novartis majority ownership. While at Alcon, he served as President and General Manager of Alcon Vision Care Franchise Alcon Laboratories and as President, U.S. and Canada, after serving in other leadership positions of increasing responsibilities for several years. He currently serves on the board of two public companies. At INARI Medical, Mr. Warner serves on its audit committee, and at RXSight Inc. he serves as chair of the nominating and corporate governance committee and as a member of the compensation committee. In addition, Mr. Warner serves on the board of two private medical device companies, i-Lumen Scientific, where he is also a member of the compensation committee, and EyeYon Medical, where he also serves as Chairman of the board. Mr. Warner holds a B.S. in Chemistry from Pace University and an MBA from Rutgers University. Arshad M. Khanani, M.D., M.A., FASRS founded the clinical research section at Sierra Eye Associates, and currently serves as its Managing Partner, Director of Clinical Research, and Director of Fellowship. He has been a principal investigator for more than 120 clinical trials and a top enroller in the United States for multiple Phase 1-3 trials. He is also a Clinical Professor at the University of Nevada, Reno School of Medicine. Dr. Khanani is an elected member of the Retina Society, Macula Society and has received numerous awards of distinction. He has received the Senior Honor Award from the American Society of Retina Specialists (ASRS) and was also awarded the prestigious ASRS Presidents’ Young Investigator Award in 2021. Dr. Khanani completed his Fellowship in Vitreo-Retinal Diseases and Surgery at the UT Southwestern Medical Center, his Chief Resident in Ophthalmology and his Ophthalmology Residency Program at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, where he also received his Doctor of Medicine (M.D.) degree. Dr. Khanani completed an Internship in Internal Medicine at Baylor College and received a Master and Bachelor of Arts (M.A. and B.A.) in Chemistry from Washington University in St. Louis. Frank G. Holz, F.E.B.O., F.A.R.V.O. is Professor and Chairman of the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of Bonn, Germany. His main research interests include the pathogenesis, biomarkers and new therapies for macular and retinal diseases including age-related macular degeneration, retinal vascular diseases and macular telangiectasia. His major clinical interest is medical and surgical retina. He has a keen interest in innovative retinal imaging technologies and image analysis strategies. He was a scholar of the German National Academic Foundation (Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes), trained at the University of Heidelberg, Germany, and the University of Chicago/Pritzker School of Medicine, and passed a fellowhip at Moorfields Eye Hospital, London, with Prof. Alan C. Bird. Professor Holz has been a cofounder of the Priority Program AMD of the German Research Council (DFG) and founded the GRADE Reading Center Bonn to perform digital image analysis in multicentre clinical natural history and interventional trials, and is project lead of the Macustar study funded by the IMI2 EU program. He is a Board Member of the German Ophthalmological Society (DOG), and EURETINA, Member of the Club Jules Gonin, the European Academy of Ophthalmology (EAO), the Macula Society, the Gass Club, Editor-in-Chief of Der Ophthalmologe, and serves a reviewer for many peer reviewed journals. He has received numerous awards including the Pro Retina Macular Degeneration Research Award, the Leonhard-Klein Award for Ocular Surgery, the Alcon Research Institute (ARI) Award, the Senior Achievement Award of the AAO and the Jules Gonin Award. He published more than 500 articles in peer reviewed journals and is editor of several books on retinal diseases. Professor Holz completed his Residency Program in Ophthalmology at the University of Heidelberg, Germany where he also received his Doctor of Medicine (M.D.) degree. Later on, he completed a Research and Clinical Fellowship in Medical Retina at the Institute of Ophthalmology, Moorfields Eye Hospital, in London, England. Baruch D. Kuppermann, M.D., Ph.D., is the Steinert Endowed Professor, Chair of the Department of Ophthalmology, and Director of the Gavin Herbert Eye Institute at the University of California, Irvine, and serves as the co-director of the Center for Translational Vision Research at UC Irvine, which is focused on developing new treatments for blinding retinal conditions. He also holds a joint appointment with the Department of Biomedical Engineering at UC Irvine. He has published over 300 peer-reviewed articles in the medical literature, and over 100 book chapters. His laboratory focuses on assessing the toxicity of drugs on retinal cells in culture, including various vital stains, steroids, and anti-VEGF compounds, as well as studying the role of mitochondrial genetics in the development of retinal diseases such as age related macular degeneration. He is also strongly involved in clinical research, having served as Principal Investigator in many trials evaluating new drugs and technologies for the treatment of age-related macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, retinal vein occlusion, retinitis pigmentosa, and other diseases of the posterior segment. He is a peer reviewer for the American Journal of Ophthalmology, Archives of Ophthalmology, Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, Journal of Infectious Diseases, Lancet, Ophthalmology, Retina, and Survey of Ophthalmology. He serves on the Editorial Board of the journal Retina, as well as the Brazilian Archives of Ophthalmology, Brazilian Journal of Ophthalmology, and Retina Today. Dr. Kuppermann also serves on the Board of Directors of the Armenian EyeCare Project. He received his Ph.D. in neuroscience at the California Institute of Technology, and his medical degress at the University of Miami. He completed his residency at University of Southern California Doheny Eye Institute and his fellowships in Retina at both St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Baltimore under Drs Ronald Michels and Bert Glaser, and at the University of California, San Diego.