The science of skincare
As the mastermind behind Optiphi explains, it’s the active ingredients that make all the difference
Taking a Tour of Southern group’s campus in irene is as imposing as it is impressive.
I arrived expecting to gain some insight into a proudly South African skincare brand, delving into how it aims to stand out in a very crowded environment. I wasn’t expecting to find a group of companies that’s leading and innovating in every corner – and a group whose collective expertise is welcomed and solicited from all over the globe.
The Amount Of biomedical engineering THAT TAKES place here IS Staggering. Formed in 1987, the group had its start developing and manufacturing dental implants at a time when the underlying science was still in its infancy. Since then, the group’s implants division has pioneered implant integration, surgical techniques, patient education and treatment options, and has become a significant role player in this field globally. Understanding how to design and manufacture dental implants, and establishing and maintaining the standards, led the group to establish
Southern Medical, which develops orthopaedic and neurosurgical implants – for everything including spinal surgery, foot surgery and facial surgery – along with the equipment needed to carry out these procedures, right down to the very (complex) operating tables.
The group’s biomedical quality standards allowed for exploration into other fields, along with creating artificial heart valves, and wound care, with everything from honey-based ointments to temporary skin substitutes to allow patients to recover from severe skin traumas like burns.
At the beating heart of this operation is Dr Malan de Villiers, the group MD and visionary behind the multi-armed group and founder of Skin Rejuvenation Technologies. Says Dr De Villiers, ‘I spoke to a plastic surgeon who said, “You’ve got wonderful scientists, they’re focused on the skin. Why don’t you develop the best skincare product?”’
That product is Skin Rejuvenation’s flagship brand, Optiphi, created specifically to target the factors that contribute to aging. Like the rest of the group’s products, it was developed with science in mind from the beginning. ‘Optiphi is at the forefront of what skincare corporations can offer you,’
Dr De Villiers explains. ‘We have an intimate knowledge, due in part to our experience with medical device design, we also have expertise not only in cell biology and genetics but also in coating design, for instance, so we design the most effective carrier to get that active ingredient into your skin.’
Marketing, packaging or brand perception aside, the real success factor in any skincare brand is the quality of its active ingredients. ‘Most skincare brands buy pre-developed actives from big active [producers]. We particularly possess the capability of developing our own actives, and our own delivery mechanisms. We collaborate with academic plastic surgeons all over the world, and our team cross-pollinates [their knowledge] with our wound care team,’ says Dr De Villiers.
Research and development guide the way forward here, as Dr De Villiers explains Optiphi’s approach to creating new formulations. ‘We’ve patented a way of individualising skincare treatments, because not everyone has the same skin. The moisturiser that works for me may not work for you. We look at your skin, we look at your
DNA and we look at all the aging factors – what your skin has the propensity to do, along with the things you’ve done to your skin in terms of sun damage. From that we determine a score, and the score highlights major areas of concern unique to you. We then look at the products that you should be using. Then we look at the actives in the product, and we score the products according to the actives within it.’
How does this translate to the actual product – and how do you know which range is right for you? ‘Many brands [continuously] bring out new ranges. If we improve the original product, we don’t need to create something new. If the product’s efficacy against wrinkling goes from 12 to 14, for example, we don’t want to expand the range to the extent that it becomes unmanageable – we would rather just reformulate the existing product,’ says Dr De Villiers.
And it’s an approach he hopes will further impact the rest of the industry. ‘Within our group, we have each discipline focused on its own area of expertise, but they’re all medical device companies, so there’s a natural cross-pollination that occurs. Manufacturing machining products is different to making heart valves, but they both have to comply with the same [kinds of] quality. There’s always a different way of doing something, and you see it much more clearly when you’re involved in all the different aspects of the bigger picture.’
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