Daniel Levangie inspires graduates of Northeastern’s Bouve College of Health Sciences.
Daniel Levangie was a few months into his job at Abbott Laboratories in 1975 when he became inspired by the words of the English poet and playwright Robert Browning.
He was at a company party celebrating. He and a round of other new employees had successfully completed the company’s rigorous training program. During the celebration, a senior executive gave a speech that referenced the 19th-century writer’s famous “Rabbi Ben Ezra” poem.
“In that poem, Browning stated, ‘What I aspired to be, and was not, comforts me,’” Levangie said Tuesday afternoon in addressing Bouvé College of Health Sciences’ newest graduates.
“That simple phrase caught me. It resonated with me for some reason and caused me to think about the broader meaning of that statement as a directive to not be timid, to not be intimidated, to not be afraid of striving to do great things.”
Levangie was a young man at the time, having only graduated from Northeastern University with a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy a couple years earlier in 1973. He was looking to do big things with his career.
Today, with over five decades of experience as a health care executive and investor, Levangie, now CEO, president and chairman of the medical device company CereVasc, says Browning’s words continue to inspire him. He channeled him when speaking to the graduates.
“It’s really up to you individually to aspire to greatness, to dream, to not be intimidated by your aspirations, to chase after the big challenges, knowing that if you fail, you’ll be comforted by the effort,” Levangie said.
In addition to serving at CereVasc, Levangie is also a co-founder and manager of the private investment firm ATON Partners, which invests in medical technologies. At Northeastern, Levangie serves as an advisory board member at the Barnett Institute of Chemical and Biological Analysis.
Levangie has held many executive positions over the years, including stints at Insulet Drug Delivery Systems and Dune Medical Devices. But in speaking with the graduates, he focused on his work at Cytyc Health Corp., a health care company known for developing screening technologies for cervical and breast cancer.
He joined the company in 1992. The company was young and only had a handful of employees. Its technology was still being proven out, Levangie said. It was a risky bet for Levangie, who had a stable job, a sizable mortgage, a child in college and another heading there soon.
But thinking back on Browning’s words, Levangie took the plunge and joined a company that was looking to improve the accuracy of screening women for cervical cancer with better testing technologies.
“At the time, the conventional Pap smear was the very successful and widely adopted test that was thought to be the ideal screening test. It was low cost,” he said. “It was widely available. It was simple to perform. It had become part of a woman’s annual medical exam, so the startup that I joined was truly David taking on Goliath.”
As the company built up over the next decade and conducted more clinical trials, Levangie said, he was reminded of Browning’s poem every day.
“Failure was a constant nagging element of our day-to-day existence,” he said.
While health care workers loved the company’s tests, insurance companies were not interested in paying for them. Additionally, lab technicians were reluctant to learn new processes and protocols to conduct the testing. Thirdly, the medical industry as a whole was apprehensive to change the screening process at all, he said.
“Our response to these and other obstacles, however, was to persevere, to continue to work with labs to publish their results until the weight of the clinical evidence supporting the implementation of our testing was too strong to ignore,” he said.
The tide began to turn for the company in the early 2000s as more medical facilities began to implement its testing. Success continued to follow in the two decades since.
“The tests we introduced in 1996 remain the standard today, with more than 90% of all cervical screening tests in the United States employing the technology that we introduced almost 30 years ago,” he said.
In closing, Levangie encouraged the students to dream big even in the face of disappointment. In fact, failure is key.
“Through these lessons and hardships and obstacles and setbacks, I learned that if you set your sights high enough, failure will become a close friend and a confidant,” he said. “It’ll scare you in directions you never thought possible. It’s your most honest teacher and constant adviser.”
It’s the price we pay in pursuit of our great aspirations.