Editor’s note: ‘Charlotte Beat’ will appear every Wednesday, focusing on an entrepreneur or company having an impact on the region’s high-tech economy. Jonathon Benson, Ph.D., founder and former chief executive officer of the Ben Craig Center incubator, moved his offices down the hall in 1997 to become CEO of a start-up he liked enough to give up his old job.

Medical Optical Imaging, Inc. (MOI) is developing a laser-based device that could dramatically reduce the number of breast biopsies performed on women with suspicious lumps. And MOI hopes to have its non-ionizing optical mammography device on the market by 2004.

“Our device has a lot of advantages over traditional mammograms that use x-rays, and it will save lives and money,” Benson says.

Using light to digitize images

The optical mammogram uses near-infrared light from lasers to produce three-dimensional digital images of a breast.

“An x-ray is very good at sensitivity, being able to see something, but is not very good at specificity, telling whether the lump is benign or malignant,” Benson explains. “The optical mammogram is good at both. “

That will make the new device a powerful diagnostic tool and help eliminate the need for biopsies to determine whether a lump is cancerous. Currently, a lump is found to be benign about 80 percent of the time. In addition, the optical mammogram is better able to see through fibrous tissue, characteristic of breast tissue in younger women. It also requires 50 percent less compression on the breast, making the procedure less painful. The initial product will be for diagnostic purposes for women who have lumps. However, later versions may be modified for use as a screening device for asymptomatic women.

Potential markets

Initial clinical studies have been conducted, and others are continuing. Benson expects FDA trials to begin in the fourth quarter, with final approvals received for a 2004 entry in to the American market. But he thinks they will be able to enter the Asian market sooner.

“The Japanese have a cultural adversity to x-rays, and the incidence of breast cancer is on the rise there,” Benson says. “There’s a real need and opportunity there, and we have several Japanese investors.”

MOI has raised more than $2.5 million in equity capital from high-net-worth investors and $950,000 in federal Small Business Innovation Research grants from the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health. “This is a product that could have a lot of impact and which private investors understand,” Benson notes. “With many technical companies, they are so conceptual, it’s hard for investors to see the potential market.”

Looking into the future

But it does require patience.

“We are not an Internet company. When you go for five years without a sale, you have to create milestones for yourself,” Benson observes. “You focus on things that add value to the company – like clinical data, approvals, intellectual property and people.”

It also helps to look way into the future, with an exit strategy. Benson predicts the firm will either go public or sell to a larger company. “If it works, this will make a lot of money,” he says.

But it was the challenges of starting a new firm that motivated Benson to leave the Ben Craig Center after 12 years and helping more than 100 developmental technology and information-based companies. As a Center tenant, he is appreciative of the support he gets, especially in preventing him from feeling isolated.

It was common for professors from UNC Charlotte to approach Benson about what to do with technology they were developing. That’s how the idea for MOI got started. The original professors did not pursue marketing the technology, so Benson and his partners licensed it from UNC Charlotte and began the long process.

Other members of the management team include Mark D. Modell, vice president and chief technical officer, who has more than 30 years of experience in applying laser and optics to industrial and medical problems; Richard R. Bird, vice president of clinical affairs, experienced in the manufacture of x-ray mammogram devices; and Dr. Lev Perlman, chief scientist, a biophysicist with Harvard Medical School.

MOI is not alone, however, in developing an optical mammogram, and it is in a race with three other competitors. Because of that, Benson has kept MOI’s profile low. “Every time I read about one of my competitors’ accomplishments, it motivates me to work harder. I don’t want to nurture them,” Benson says. “On the other hand, you have to have some visibility, and I have already begun talking to some big companies so they know about us.”

If all goes well for Benson and MOI, by 2004, a lot of people will know about them.