SAFFRON WALDEN, Essex, U.K.— Contamac, which manufactures high performance materials for contact lenses and intraocular lenses, has entered into a licensing agreement with the Brien Holden Vision Institute, which develop solutions for vision care and eliminates vision impairment and avoidable blindness. The multi-year license enables Contamac to commercialize and distribute customized silicone hydrogel and GP contact lens products based on utilizing background intellectual property on myopia control from the Brien Holden Vision Institute.

“We hear time and time again that eye care professionals are regularly practicing myopia control with contact lenses in their patients, with recent reports suggesting that this number could be as high as 24 percent, and, most importantly, the interest within the specialty contact lens industry is growing ever so rapidly,” said Martin Dalsing, Contamac’s director of global strategy and business development. “Making available these specialized custom lens parameters and designs to the eyecare professional through our laboratory network will be crucial for today’s modern specialty contact lens practice.”

Professor Brien Holden, CEO, Brien Holden Vision Institute, commented, “This is an important step in making effective myopia control technologies available to reduce the rate of progress of myopia and the risk of permanent vision impairment associated with high levels of myopia later in life. Myopic macular degeneration is now the leading cause of new blindness in some locations in Asia, and with the number of myopes estimated to reach 2.2 billion by 2020 and the number of high myopes increasing rapidly, there is an urgent need for better interventions.”

Under the terms of the license, Contamac Ltd. will begin to commercialize specialized contact lenses designed to reduce the rate of myopia progression in children by sub-licensing the Contamac designs to key strategic partners within its existing customer base throughout the world, commencing in May 2015. The technology licensed by Brien Holden Vision Institute includes numerous U.S. and foreign patents. Currently, a myopia control indication for use submission to the U.S. FDA is to be completed in early 2017 as part of Contamac Ltd’s commercialization plan.

In other news, Contamac also announced a multi-year licensing, sub-licensable, manufacturing and commercialization agreement with Ocular Dynamics, which creates technologies that improve comfort for contact lens patients who experience dryness during lens wear. Under the new agreement, Ocular Dynamics will incorporate its Hydra-PEG Technology into Contamac’s Definitive 50 and Definitive 65 Silicone Hydrogel materials.

The companies said they are also discussing an agreement for incorporating the Hydra-PEG technology into Contamac’s line of Optimum GP materials. The agreement also calls for Contamac to begin the worldwide commercialization of incorporating the Hydra-PEG technology into specialty contact lenses that are manufactured in its Definitive brand of silicone hydrogel materials, through sub-licensing the technology to the entire Contamac Ltd. global laboratory network channel, starting in May 2015.