Doug Perkins Doug Perkins Douglas John David Perkins (born April 1943) is a British billionaire businessman. He is the co-founder of Specsavers, an international optical retail chain. Douglas John David Perkins was born in April 1943 in Llanelli, Carmarthenshire, Wales. "His father was a policeman and his grandparents were farmers in the county for generations." He was educated at the Llanelli Boys Grammar School, and he graduated from Cardiff University. Perkins began his career as an optometrist in Llanelli and Carmarthen. In the 1970s, he took over his father-in-law's optician store in Bristol and subsequently opened 22 stores. Perkins co-founded Specsavers with
Rodney Perkins of these companies have been taken public. Perkins is the founder of three public companies: Collagen Corporation (collagen-based implant materials), Laserscope (surgical lasers), and ReSound Corporation (high tech signal processing hearing devices). He is also the founder and Chairman of Novacept (women's health), sold to Cytyc Corporation, Sound ID (hearing science), Pulmonx (interventional pulmonology and emphysema treatment), and was Chairman of Surgrx (electrosurgical instrumentation), which was sold to Ethicon Endo-Surgery, a division of Johnson & Johnson, in 2008. Currently, Perkins is founder, Chairman and CMO of Earlens Corporation, which is developing what it hopes will be a new method of