Acuvue

Acuvue (from "Accurate view") is a brand of disposable contact lenses. They are made by Vistakon, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson (J&J). Vistakon is headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida. The company was built from Frontier Contact Lens, bought out by J&J in 1981. The Acuvue lens was introduced in 1987.

Overview

Acuvue lenses got their start at Frontier Contact Lens Company, a small company that started in the 1950s and opened a branch in Jacksonville. Headed by Seymour Marco, an optometrist, the company started to grow and, after a few years, Marco bought out the New York owners so he could significantly grow the business.

During the 1970s, he developed a new material (etafilcon A) and began making soft lenses at Frontier. In 1981 he sold the company to Johnson & Johnson. Johnson & Johnson renamed Frontier Contact Lenses to Vistakon. With the acquisition of a very manual process - every employee on the production line, whether they were lathing, polishing or inspecting, handled the lenses - scaling up the business was very limited, so Vistakon decided to invest into a new production process.