Miles D. White

Miles D. White (born 1955) is an American businessman. He had a 38-year career with Abbott Laboratories, most prominently being CEO between 1999 and 2020. Early life and education Miles White was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He went to Culver Military Academy at age 13. He holds two degrees from Stanford University, a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering and an MBA. Career White started his career as a consultant at McKinsey & Co. He joined Abbott in 1984, serving there in management positions including Senior Vice President of Diagnostic Operations and Executive Vice President. He was elected to the board of directors in April 1998, to chief executive officer in 1999, and to chairman of the board in April 1999. Despite a $100M FDA consent decree for deficiencies in the Abbott Diagnostics Division that he led, White was named Abbott CEO As of November 2019, White's tenure is the second longest for a non-founder CEO among the S&P 100. Under his leadership and an extremely business friendly federal regulatory stance, he has created approximately $200 billion in shareholder value. White has been praised for the ability to position Abbott to be able to adapt to patient and consumer needs and creating a diverse culture at the company. He has also been praised for increasing the global stature and valuation of Abbott and expanding the company's worldwide sales. He has created two public companies as the CEO of Abbott: AbbVie and Hospira. Hospira was later purchased by Pfizer for $16 billion.