PEOPLE

◄ Bollé Brands appointed François Benaben as president of the group’s sport and luxury division. Benaben joins the company with more than 20 years of experience in several sales and category management positions. He most recently served as vice president for Rossignol Group for Europe, Asia, and the Southern Hemisphere.

Alessandro Beccarini has been named style & product development director for Marcolin Group. Throughout his career, which included roles at Prada and Luxottica, Beccarini has overseen the management and development of various product and eyewear collections.

◄ VSP Global announced that Marvin Davenport has been named as the organization’s first chief diversity officer, responsible for accelerating VSP’s diversity and inclusion (D&I) strategy and overseeing D&I initiatives. Davenport joins VSP Global with more than a decade of experience in D&I leadership roles, most recently with Amazon Web Services.

◄ WestGroupe appointed Jim Sepanek to Western regional sales manager for WestGroupe U.S.A. Sepanek brings nearly 30 years of industry experience to the role, most recently as vice president of business development for De Rigo REM. Separately, the company has announced the promotion of Alexis Nyiro to director of product and marketing.

AWARDS

The American Academy of Optometry Foundation announced Charlotte Yiyi Wang, O.D., as this year’s recipient of the Hopkins Comprehensive Eye Care Award, which honors Douglas W. Hopkins, O.D., FAAO, a leader within the Primary Care Section of the Academy, who passed in 2007. Dr. Wang is a primary care/community health resident at the Meredith W. Morgan University Eye Center in Berkeley, CA.

CooperCompanies, along with its CooperVision and CooperSurgical divisions, has been named as one of Fortune’s Best Large Workplaces in Manufacturing and Production 2020.

Maui Jim won a 2020 Travel Retail Award for its Hikina sunglasses in the sunglasses/eyewear category.

Morgan Rogers received the 2020 VSP Vision of Hope Scholarship. The scholarship is funded by VSP Global and awarded annually by the Kentucky College of Optometry to one of its excelling first-year students who intends to practice in the rural Appalachian region where the school is located.

MISCELLANEOUS

CooperVision opened submissions for its sixth annual Best Practices program. Applications, which will be reviewed by a panel of judges consisting of past Best Practices honorees, industry experts, and CooperVision leaders, can be submitted through Nov. 23.

EyeCare Partners LLC launched the Crisis Aid Relief for Employees (ECP CAREs) Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping EyeCare Partners employees in need.

National Vision Holdings, Inc., announced that its sixth annual optometry student grant program is open for entries. The 2020-2021 grant program challenges third- and fourth-year optometry students to share which changes implemented during the Covid-19 pandemic they believe will become a fixture in how optometrists practice and provide health care services in the future.