ProStrakan turns to Optos finance chief to fill void left by Garvey's departure

Published on Wednesday 3 June 2009 21:43

PROSTRAKEN has poached Allan Watson, the chief financial officer of Optos.

The move came after ProStraken's current finance director, Paul Garvey, announced yesterday he was stepping down for personal reasons.

Last year, Garvey suffered a minor stroke and, while the company said he had fully recovered, the 56-year-old, who is based in Glasgow, has now elected to give up the job.

He joined ProStrakan, a specialist pharmaceutical company, after holding a similar role at another listed Scottish medical company.

He spent seven years at Axis-Shield, the medical diagnostics group, where he was finance director and company secretary.

After steering Axis-Shield into profitability, he left and was soon appointed to Galashiels-based ProStrakan in 2007.

He said at the time that he wanted another challenge and that, at 54, he either had to leave then or end his executive career with the Dundee company.

Yesterday, ProStrakan chief executive Wilson Totten said Garvey had made a "significant and valuable" contribution to ProStrakan.

"I regret, as I know he does, that the period of ill health he suffered in 2008 has led him to step down now," Totten said.

Garvey will stay on at ProStrakan until Optos replaces Watson to ensure an "orderly handover".

Watson has been at Optos since 2003, guiding the retinal scanning machine maker through its flotation in 2006 and into profitability for the first time in 2007. He also served briefly as interim chief executive after the hasty departure of Frenchman Stephane Sallmard.

Shares in ProStrakan rose 1.4 per cent to 90p, while Optos, which has been rising strongly for the past six weeks, was up 9.5p to 70.5p.