Second Sight Announces Appointments of Frank Vandeputte as Vice President and General Manager, EMEA and Asia Pacific; Gregoire Cosendai as Vice President, Clinical Affairs

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--Vandeputte to Lead All Commercial Activities for Second Sight outside of North America--

SYLMAR, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Second Sight Medical Products, Inc. (NASDAQ:EYES) ("Second Sight" or "the Company"), a developer, manufacturer and marketer of implantable visual prosthetics that provide useful vision to blind patients, today announced the appointment of Frank Vandeputte as Vice President and General Manager, EMEA and Asia Pacific, where he will lead all commercial activities for the Company outside of North America.

Mr. Vandeputte is an international sales and marketing executive with extensive commercial experience in high-tech medical devices, including senior positions with TriVascular, Inc., Aptus Endosystems, EBR Systems, Inc., Oxford Immuniotech, Sorin Group and Guidant. He also has a track record of launching innovative technologies with a focus on driving adoption, and managing and building new businesses throughout the European Union. He will report directly to Mr. Will McGuire, Second Sight’s President and Chief Executive Officer.

In addition, Gregoire Cosendai has been appointed as Vice President, Clinical Affairs. Dr. Cosendai will direct all clinical activities including feasibility and pivotal trials for the Orion™ Cortical Visual Prosthesis System (Orion), as well as clinical trials designed to expand the population of patients treatable by the Argus® II Retinal Prosthesis System to include retinitis pigmentosa (RP) patients with better vision. Dr. Cosendai was formerly Vice President of European Operations for the Company. He will continue to report to Mr. McGuire.

“Frank joins us with more than 30 years of sales and marketing experience in medical devices. His leadership and commercialization experience, coupled with our strong team in Europe, will position us for continued success outside of the U.S. and Canada,” said Will McGuire. “I’m also very pleased that Greg has assumed a new position leading our clinical affairs team. His first priority is the initiation of the Orion feasibility trial followed by the planning and execution of a pivotal trial. Orion is an exciting technology that can potentially restore useful vision to millions of patients who today have no option,” concluded McGuire.

About the Orion™ Visual Cortical Prosthesis System
Second Sight, the manufacturer of the Argus II Retinal Prosthesis System (Argus II), has developed a new device, the Orion. A proof-of-concept clinical trial demonstrating the viability of stimulation of the human visual cortex with a commercially available device from a different manufacturer began in Q4 2016 at UCLA. First-in-human clinical studies with the Orion are planned in 2017. Like the Argus II, the idea behind Second Sight’s Orion is to convert images captured by a miniature video camera mounted on the patient's glasses into a series of small electrical pulses. The Orion is designed to transmit these electrical pulses wirelessly to an array of electrodes implanted on the surface of the visual cortex, intended to result in the perception of patterns of light. By bypassing the retina and optic nerve and directly stimulating the visual cortex, a cortical prosthesis system has the potential to restore useful vision to patients completely blinded due to many reasons, including glaucoma, diabetic retinopathy, or forms of cancer and trauma. No clinical data is yet available for the Orion.

About the Argus II Retinal Prosthesis System
Second Sight's Argus II System provides electrical stimulation that bypasses the defunct retinal cells and stimulates remaining viable cells inducing visual perception in individuals with severe to profound Retinitis Pigmentosa. The Argus II works by converting images captured by a miniature video camera mounted on the patient's glasses into a series of small electrical pulses, which are transmitted wirelessly to an array of electrodes implanted on the surface of the retina. These pulses stimulate the retina's remaining cells, intending to result in the perception of patterns of light in the brain. The patient must learn to interpret these visual patterns, having the potential to regain some visual function. The Argus II was the first artificial retina to receive widespread commercial approval, and is offered at approved centers in Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Spain, Taiwan, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Please consult your physician if you have any questions. Further information about the Argus II, in particular about its indication, counter-indications, the results achieved in patients with severe to profound Retinitis Pigmentosa, possible side effects and previously observed incidents can be found on this page: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0161642016305796.

About Second Sight
Second Sight's mission is to develop, manufacture and market innovative implantable visual prosthetics to enable blind individuals to achieve greater independence. Second Sight has developed, and now manufactures and markets, the Argus® II Retinal Prosthesis System. Enrollment has been completed in a feasibility trial to test the safety and utility of the Argus II in individuals with Dry Age-Related Macular Degeneration. Second Sight is also developing the Orion™ Visual Cortical Prosthesis to restore some vision to individuals who are blind due to causes other than preventable or treatable conditions. U.S. Headquarters are in Sylmar, California, and European Headquarters are in Lausanne, Switzerland. For more information, visit www.secondsight.com.

Safe Harbor
This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange and Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, which are intended to be covered by the "safe harbor" created by those sections. All statements in this release that are not based on historical fact are "forward looking statements." These statements may be identified by words such as "estimates," "anticipates," "projects," "plans," or "planned," "seeks," "may," "will," "expects," "intends," "believes," "should," and similar expressions, or the negative versions thereof, and which also may be identified by their context. All statements that address operating performance or events or developments that Second Sight expects or anticipates will occur in the future, such as stated objectives or goals, or that are not otherwise historical facts, are forward-looking statements. While management has based any forward-looking statements included in this release on its current expectations, the information on which such expectations were based may change. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties which could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements, as a result of various factors including those risks and uncertainties described in the Risk Factors and in Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations sections of our Annual Report, on Form 10-K, as filed on March 16, 2017, and our other reports filed from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission. We urge you to consider those risks and uncertainties in evaluating our forward-looking statements. We caution readers not to place undue reliance upon any such forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date made. Except as otherwise required by the federal securities laws, we disclaim any obligation or undertaking to publicly release any updates or revisions to any forward-looking statement contained herein (or elsewhere) to reflect any change in our expectations with regard thereto, or any change in events, conditions, or circumstances on which any such statement is based.

Investor Relations:
Institutional Investors
In-Site Communications, Inc.
Lisa Wilson, 212-452-2793
President
lwilson@insitecony.com
or
Individual Investors
MZ North America
Greg Falesnik, 949-385-6449
Managing Director
greg.falesnik@mzgroup.us

Source: Second Sight Medical Products, Inc.

Released October 19, 2017