Calendar An icon of a desk calendar. Cancel An icon of a circle with a diagonal line across. Caret An icon of a block arrow pointing to the right. Email An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of the Facebook "f" mark. Google An icon of the Google "G" mark. Linked In An icon of the Linked In "in" mark. Logout An icon representing logout. Profile An icon that resembles human head and shoulders. Telephone An icon of a traditional telephone receiver. Tick An icon of a tick mark. Is Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes. Is Not Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes with a diagonal line through it. Pause Icon A two-lined pause icon for stopping interactions. Quote Mark A opening quote mark. Quote Mark A closing quote mark. Arrow An icon of an arrow. Folder An icon of a paper folder. Breaking An icon of an exclamation mark on a circular background. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Caret An icon of a caret arrow. Clock An icon of a clock face. Close An icon of the an X shape. Close Icon An icon used to represent where to interact to collapse or dismiss a component Comment An icon of a speech bubble. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Ellipsis An icon of 3 horizontal dots. Envelope An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Home An icon of a house. Instagram An icon of the Instagram logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. Magnifying Glass An icon of a magnifying glass. Search Icon A magnifying glass icon that is used to represent the function of searching. Menu An icon of 3 horizontal lines. Hamburger Menu Icon An icon used to represent a collapsed menu. Next An icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Notice An explanation mark centred inside a circle. Previous An icon of an arrow pointing to the left. Rating An icon of a star. Tag An icon of a tag. Twitter An icon of the Twitter logo. Video Camera An icon of a video camera shape. Speech Bubble Icon A icon displaying a speech bubble WhatsApp An icon of the WhatsApp logo. Information An icon of an information logo. Plus A mathematical 'plus' symbol. Duration An icon indicating Time. Success Tick An icon of a green tick. Success Tick Timeout An icon of a greyed out success tick. Loading Spinner An icon of a loading spinner. Facebook Messenger An icon of the facebook messenger app logo. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Facebook Messenger An icon of the Twitter app logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. WhatsApp Messenger An icon of the Whatsapp messenger app logo. Email An icon of an mail envelope. Copy link A decentered black square over a white square.

Love story behind Optos vision

Love story behind Optos vision

You will seldom find a love story in the business pages of this or any other newspaper.

On an average day journalists of my ilk spend hours trawling through company accounts, speaking to business leaders and watching the progress of the various FTSE indices.

At the end of the day, business is a relatively transparent world of success and failure where the bottom line is king and there is little room for sentiment.

But scratch below that bald veneer and the business world can be, in turn, fascinating, perplexing and inspiring.

Few know, for example, that vital parts for spacecraft are designed and engineered from a nondescript office off Dundee’s Perth Road.

Or that parts for cutting edge defence systems deployed on aircraft and naval ships in fleets across the globe are produced in Fife.

Or indeed that the kingdom is also responsible for packaging for those highest of high-end French cosmetics houses.

Oh, and there’s the century old jute merchant which grew into a global textiles business that went on to produce the artificial playing surface used in the Superbowl.

They are all terrific back stories and, believe me, I could go on spouting similar tales for days given half a chance.

But there are seldom few examples of corporate success in these parts that I can attribute to love.

Well until last week that is.

On Friday, Dunfermline-based medical devices firm Optos secured its little corner in the annals of Scottish corporate history when Japanese photography and imaging giant Nikon came in with a £260 million offer for the company.

That is an extraordinary sum of money by anyone’s standards and, when it concludes as expected in late Spring, it will stand out as one of the largest corporate acquisitions ever seen in Fife.

Now that makes for great copy for a business editor as everyone loves a ‘local lad done good’ type of story and Optos has quite plainly done good.

The terms of the deal looks favourable on the surface with a commitment to maintain jobs and to keep the firm’s headquarters where it is. Great stuff.

But you may well be asking what this has to do with love.

Well the back story of our quarter of a billion pound corporate champion is about the unbreakable bond between a father and his child .

More than 20 years ago a young boy called Leif Anderson was struck blind in one eye.

The five-year-old had been having regular eye examinations but he sadly lost his sight after a retinal detachment was spotted too late.

That tragic incident spurred his dad Douglas into action.

He was determined other children would not suffer in the same manner as Leif had and set out to create a patient friendly imaging device that could capture an image of the entire retina.

To do so was no mean feat and involved many years of development work alongside colleagues David Cairns and Robert Henderson.

But incredibly they succeeded in their mission and Optos emerged.

Fourteen years after its foundation, Optos floated on the stock exchange and it has continued to pursue its sight-saving mission ever since.

Healthcare is a notoriously competitive game and it is fair to say that Optos has had its share of ups and downs in the intervening years.

But it is now a global player in its field and with annual revenues topping $170m it really is no surprise that a large corporate like Nikon has come calling

That was all inspired by a father’s love for an innocent child.

If it was not real life it could easily be a film script.