Avedro Adds $10M to Coffers, Eyes New Vision-Correction Tech

Ryan McBride5/11/09

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[[Updated: please see editor's note below]] Avedro, a Waltham, MA-based startup developing a vision-correction procedure, has landed $10 million in a Series B round of equity financing, according to an SEC filing. New investor Flagship Ventures of Cambridge, MA, led the financing round, which included all previous backers from the firm’s first-round financing, Avedro CEO David Muller told Xconomy in an e-mail this morning. Flagship general partner Doug Cole has joined the board of directors at Avedro.

In March, Avedro began human testing of its vision-correction procedure, according to Muller, who is traveling abroad and was unavailable to talk by phone this morning. (Avedro director Philip Ferneau, a managing director at Borealis Ventures, which is an investor in the startup, told me earlier this year that the company was beginning human clinical trials.) Muller was the chairman and CEO of former Summit Technology, which was the first company to get FDA approval for laser vision correction, according to Avedro.

Avedro says it is developing a procedure called “Keraflex” to correct vision by reshaping the surface of the cornea with “focused heat.” The technology, which was initially developed at Dartmouth College, does not involve making incisions in the eye like popular Lasik procedures do. The procedure could offer an alternative to using eyeglasses or contact lenses to correct low-to-moderate nearsightedness, according to the company.

Last year Avedro revealed it had raised $8 million in a Series A round of venture capital financing led by Prism VentureWorks. The startup’s other previous investors include De Novo Ventures and Echelon Ventures. [[Editor's note: this story was updated at 11:45 a.m. Eastern time with information provided to Xconomy in an e-mail from Avedro CEO David Muller, who is traveling outside the U.S. and couldn't be reached before this report was first published this morning.]]