Apyx Medical adds first woman to board

The board of directors at Apyx Medical Corp. no longer is exclusively male.

Apyx (Nasdaq: APYX), a Clearwater-based medical technology firm, appointed Minnie Baylor-Henry as a director and as chair of the board’s newly-created regulatory and compliance committee.

Baylor-Henry, the president of B-Henry & Associates in Boston, has more than 20 years of regulatory experience, including serving as worldwide vice president of regulatory affairs for Johnson & Johnson’s Medical Devices business.

Until now, Apyx, formerly Bovie Medical Corp., was one of just two locally based companies traded on a major stock exchange that didn’t have any women on their boards.

The other company, United Insurance Holdings Corp. (Nasdaq: UIHC), a property insurance company in St. Petersburg, still has no female board members.

Gender diversity at the board level is a key investor focus. Institutional investors that control big blocks of stock such as BlackRock Inc. and State Street say board diversity is linked to better returns, according to Bloomberg.

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The average number of corporate board seats held by women on the 2018 Russell 3000 Index has risen to 17.7 percent, up from 16 percent last year, said a report from advocacy organization 2020 Women on Boards.

In Florida, women make up 17.1 percent of the directors at the 107 companies in the state on the Russell 3000.

Apyx was added to the Russell 3000 on July 1. The company just reported Q2 financial results, including a 78 percent increase in revenue to $6.6 million, and a net loss of $2.9 million for the three months ended June 30.

Baylor-Henry was appointed to the Apyx board on Aug. 1, the same day as the company’s annual shareholders meeting, when stockholders re-elected six other directors toe the board.

In addition to Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ), Baylor-Henry has worked as a national director at Deloitte & Touche in the Regulatory Affairs Life Science practice, and during the 1990s, she worked for the U.S. Food & Drug Administration.

“Ms. Baylor-Henry is an accomplished professional in the healthcare industry with over 20 years of experience in regulatory affairs, including leadership positions at both large global medical device companies and the U.S. Food & Drug Administration,” Charlie Goodwin, Apyx CEO, said in a statement. “I’m very pleased to welcome her to our Board and look forward to her strategic insight and guidance as the Chairman of our new Regulatory and Compliance Committee.”

Apyx is the developer of J-Plasma, a patented surgical product marketed and sold under the Renuvion Cosmetic Technology brand. The company sold its legacy electrosurgical business and the Bovie brand to Symmetry Surgical last year.

The company is focused on expanding its geographic footprint by obtaining regulatory clearance for its technology in new countries, particularly those with large and growing cosmetic surgery markets, Goodwin told analysts on a conference call Wednesday. It is adding staff to its  medical team to bolster its regulatory affairs capabilities and support the development of a long-term regulatory strategy. In addition to naming Baylor-Henry to the board, the company last month named a former FDA scientific reviewer, Libet Garber, as director of global regulatory affairs.