Issue link: https://nebusinessmedia.uberflip.com/i/1541563
8 C T I N N O V A T O R S , 2 0 2 5 Continued from previous page from friends and family — is not the only startup working on a smart contact lens, a technology that has been in various stages of development for years. But aer plenty of false starts, commercial products are poised to hit the shelves. A Dubai-based company called Xpanceo, for example, is developing a lens designed to deliver augmented reality experiences to its wearers. Pantera is different, Coles said. Its first product will address a recognized pain point, rather than just putting a tiny computer on the surface of someone's eye. And he believes, based on research by his business partners, that the patents behind Pantera's technology are more commercially viable. e company's name — the Spanish word for "panther" — is meant to evoke both nature and the subtlety of its eye-worn computing technology. Coles also expressed confidence in the team he's assembled and their years of research behind the technology. Pantera's leadership includes Chief Technology Officer Randy Pugh, who began developing smart contact lenses in the 2000s while working in Johnson & Johnson's vision business, and Chief Revenue Officer Tracy Moody, former president and chief operating officer of optometry network Vision Source. "I've worked with a lot of startup teams," said Coles. "I've never been associated with one where there was such a sense of purpose." 'True to form' Coles found his purpose aer co-founding Zaytoon International, a company that blended travel to the Middle East with opportunities to volunteer. "e value prop on the U.S. side was, 'Hey, come see this region and you're going to get a cool tourism experience, but you're also going to get a chance to do something there that is meaningful,'" he said. For Coles, it was a chance to return to a region he had come to love while a student at Brigham Young University. He majored in Middle Eastern Studies/Arabic and spent a semester in Cairo, where he grasped the value of listening to different perspectives, even if he disagreed with them. "I learned how to allow myself to walk around in somebody else's shoes and just observe without judgment," he said. "It really laid the seeds of my ability to participate in teams where we have to do something creative, innovative and challenging." It was not his first adventure abroad. A former Mormon who grew up in southern California, Coles served as a missionary in Peru for two years, immersing himself in the country, its language and culture. e experience whetted his appetite for further travel. e timing for his first startup, however, was not the best. Zaytoon launched amid the Arab Spring uprisings of 2011. "at was about the worst year to start a tourism business in the Middle East," said Coles. Despite the chaos enveloping the region, Coles and his co- founders persevered for several years. Something about the experience stuck with him and provided the foundation for his turn to academia. "I noticed that the sociologists on our board of directors gave us better advice than the guys with MBAs," Coles said. He returned to the U.S. with the goal of trying to understand the best ways to build businesses in emerging markets. He got a master's degree in sociology from Brigham Young, then enrolled in a doctoral program at Cornell University under the direction of Pamela Tolbert and Wesley Sine, a sociologist studying entrepreneurship in Middle Eastern and Latin American countries. "We were like two peas in a pod," Coles said, noting that Sine also had spent time in Cairo. "We immediately had a synergy." Continued from previous page Frequent travel through the Middle East, Latin America and beyond has shaped Ryan Coles' perspective as an entrepreneur and startup founder.