(PRESS RELEASE) NEW YORK — HelpMeSee, the not-for-profit global campaign to end cataract blindness, announces the appointment of Saro Jahani as president and CEO of HelpMeSee. He is also joining the Board of Directors. Jahani succeeds Jacob Mohan Thazahathu, who retired after 10 years of dedicated service.
Jahani is a veteran in software delivery and management. For the last year, he has led all aspects of the Eye Surgery Simulator development and support. Under his direction and leadership and despite the challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, his task force, spread over three continents, delivered the complete cataract surgical simulation procedure on-time and on-budget. The cataract surgical simulation is the critical component needed to conduct the large scale training of specialists to treat the millions of cataract blind and visually impaired throughout the developing world.
“Saro has extraordinary leadership and management skills,” said Jim Ueltschi, co-founder and chairman of HelpMeSee. “He takes on every project with a ‘can-do attitude’ that is infectious. All members of his Task Force worked tirelessly under great personal stress. At the same time, Saro has a deep appreciation for his colleagues and the HelpMeSee mission. He possesses incredible ingenuity, dedication, and commitment to massively scale up the training of cataract specialists to serve the millions of blind and visually impaired living in areas where, up to now, treatment is unavailable. We are all very excited about where Saro will lead us. The future is bright.”
In accepting the leadership position, Jahani said: “The successful delivery of the Simulator is absolutely pivotal in our plan to change the course of cataract blindness in the developing world. Now, a large portion of my job as President and CEO will be to perfect the simulation along with the courseware by adding new surgical features and procedures. Additionally, to accelerate our ability to bring innovative training products and services more quickly to serve our millions of visually impaired constituents. This effort includes scaling up of the training of highly competent cataract surgical instructors who will conduct instructor-led, task-based training. HelpMeSee and its dedicated partners throughout the world will move forward by relying upon ingenuity and innovation. If you are blind and awaiting sight-restoring treatment, it can’t come fast enough. Millions of the world’s poorest people deserve access to high quality and affordable cataract treatment.”
About Saro Jahani
Jahani is known as a visionary and strategic technologist. He is adept with disruptive technologies and carries over 20 years of experience in senior leadership and technology roles.
Most recently, Jahani was the Head of Performance & Capacity Management at E*TRADE, where he was responsible for leading architectural innovation and process improvements in trading technology platforms with real-time and mission-critical features.
He has a Master of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Uppsala and is fluent in English and Swedish.