CORAL SPRINGS, Fla.—ABB Optical Group has hired Michael Dari as vice president of sales. He will lead the recently combined sales teams of ABB Concise and Optical Distributor Group (ODG). Dari brings 18 years of experience with Johnson & Johnson, 15 as strategic account director within the Vistakon division, where he was recognized for top sales performance and presented with the Strategic Account Manager of the Year Award. He received this award four times, a record for a single person within one department. Most recently, he was national account business director at Ortho Clinical Diagnostics (OCD), a Johnson & Johnson company, where he led a team of 12 managers and oversaw daily business operations.

ABB Optical Group is the new name for ABB Concise and Optical Distributor Group, as reported by VMail on May 22, 2013, after the two companies merged at the end of last year, as reported by VMail on January 9, 2013. The individual companies will be fully integrated into ABB Optical Group later this year. Together they supply more than 30,000 ECPs across the U.S. The companies also offer practice building services such as pricing strategy tools, business reviews, annual supply staff training and e-commerce solutions, including patient ordering websites yourlens.com and primaryecp.com.

“We look forward to Mike’s leadership and insights to further strengthen our overall commitment to the eyecare practitioner,” said Angel Alvarez, CEO of ABB Optical Group. “In the wake of the merger of ABB Concise and ODG, we have experienced greater customer interest in our specialty products and services. We are now in the process of expanding our existing offerings to all customers to include the products and services, from our completely customizable gas permeable and custom specialty soft contact lenses to our full service automated digital ophthalmic lens finishing lab.”

“With over 100 sales executives nationally, we are excited to continue to build upon the foundation of increasing the independent eyecare practitioner’s future growths and successes,” said Dari. “I intend to utilize my industry knowledge, relationships and experience to lead the combined sales team to the next level.”