Company: STAA
Filing Date: 2025-09-24
Form Type: DFAN14A
Source: 0001213900-25-091197
Chunk: 13

Company: STAAR SURGICAL CO
Filing Date: 2025-09-24
Form: DFAN14A
Chunk 13
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 chose to meaningfully engage with only one counterparty: Alcon. 6 We believe the Company failed to conduct any semblance of a market check or even solicit interest from a single alternative buyer. 7 Worse still, the Board made this decision despite being aware of strategic interest from two parties — so - called “Party A” and “Party B” in the Company’s proxy statement — both of whom reached out on their own to a Board member to express a desire to engage in discussions regarding a transaction during the Company’s negotiations with Alcon. 8 Though the Company later invited both parties to make a proposal, it only did so just hours before the Merger Agreement was signed, providing neither of those parties with sufficient time to perform diligence and prepare a formal proposal. The Board attempts to justify its failure to legitimately seek alternative proposals by claiming that it surmised that no other party would be able or willing to provide greater value than Alcon or advance discussions at the pace at which Alcon was prepared to proceed . 9 But, we believe that is merely an excuse — one lacking sufficient justification on the Company’s part . In deciding to sell the Company for cash, the Board was obligated to ensure it had in hand the best offer — and especially the highest price. Failing to even engage with the five or ten most likely interested parties left the Board, and us as stockholders, without any basis to be confident that the Board’s chosen transaction was the best available alternative for STAAR. We are confident that a properly conducted process — one that solicited interest from other parties beyond Alcon — would have yielded a much higher price for the Company. The unprompted interest from Party A and Party B underscores, in our view, the folly of the Board’s decision to conduct what was, effectively, an exclusive process with Alcon. Indeed, we recently have heard from several parties (none of whom we believe are Party A or Party B) who also seemingly had, and continue to have, an interest in owning the Company, but who were never contacted, never provided diligence materials, and never invited to make a proposal. We believe a board that was properly focused on maximizing stockholder value would, at a minimum, have initiated contact with other potential counterparties, even if only to generate interest, foment competitive tension, and facilitate price discovery. That STAAR’s Board failed to do so is, in our view, inexcusable. fikc W»ong fii½c ǐo fi»ansac