PETRI DISH PERSPECTIVES: BIOTECH UNLEASHED

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PETRI DISH PERSPECTIVES: BIOTECH UNLEASHED

Episode 14: Abbott

July 31, 2025 • Manead Khin • Season 1 • Episode 14

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In this episode of Petri Dish Perspectives: Biotech Unleashed, host Manead takes you inside the remarkable story of Abbott Laboratories: a company that doesn’t chase headlines but touches billions of lives every day.

From its origins in 1888 as a small Chicago pharmacy mixing precise plant-based pills, Abbott has grown into a global healthcare powerhouse behind life-changing products like the FreeStyle Libre glucose monitor, BinaxNOW COVID-19 tests, Similac baby formula, Ensure nutrition shakes, and cutting-edge heart devices.

You’ll hear how a frontier doctor’s mission for safer, more reliable medicine sparked 135+ years of steady, practical innovation, from mass-producing penicillin in WWII to pioneering rapid diagnostics in a pandemic. You’ll also learn how Abbott’s global workforce and patient-first mindset continue to solve everyday health challenges in ways that quietly shape our world.

Grab your coffee, settle in for under 30 minutes, and discover why Abbott proves that sometimes the most powerful biotech breakthroughs aren’t flashy moonshots, they’re the everyday tools that keep us living longer, healthier, and freer lives.

Listen now, stay curious, and don’t forget to subscribe for new episodes every Thursday!

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🎵 Intro

Hello and welcome to Petri Dish Perspectives: Biotech Unleashed, the podcast where we geek out about science and the companies shaping the future of healthcare. I’m your host, Manead, and I’m a PhD scientist by training, biotech storyteller by choice. With every new episode released on Thursday, my goal is to deliver digestible pieces of information on healthcare companies under 30 mins.

Today, we’re taking a closer look at Abbott Laboratories, a company that might not make splashy headlines every week like a buzzy gene-editing startup, but is deeply embedded in daily life, from the COVID tests in your bathroom drawer to the glucose monitor on your arm, or even the baby formula you see at the grocery store. This company is super interesting to me personally as I’m based in Chicago as well.

Let’s get into how a small Chicago pharmacy grew into one of the most trusted names in global health and how its steady, practical innovation keeps billions healthier every day.

Quick disclaimer: full credit goes to all original sources cited in the transcript.

Grab your coffee or tea, settle in, and let’s jump right in.

🧬 Segment 1: The Humble Beginnings

Our story starts in 1888, with a determined 30-year-old physician named Dr. Wallace Calvin Abbott — the son of Canadian immigrants, raised with the kind of work ethic and curiosity that could only come from a frontier upbringing.

Wallace Calvin Abbott was born in 1857 in Bridgewater, Ontario, Canada. His early life was shaped by rural hardship and a sense of self-reliance that defined so many families of that era. From a young age, Wallace was drawn to nature and science — fascinated by the healing properties of plants and the mysteries of the human body. His father, recognizing his son’s bright mind, supported his ambition to study medicine — still an unusual path for a young man from a small farming community.

In his early twenties, Abbott moved to Chicago to attend medical school at what is now Northwestern University. There, he was captivated by the latest scientific breakthroughs sweeping Europe and America: the discovery of microbes, the use of anesthesia, the new chemistry of isolating plant alkaloids. He graduated with a medical degree and set up practice on Chicago’s West Side — then a rough-and-tumble district packed with immigrants and factory workers who desperately needed better healthcare.

Medicine at the time was part art, part guesswork, and often dangerous. Doctors routinely mixed their own tinctures, powders, and syrups. Pharmacies were really more like small labs — but with no real controls. Patients suffering from malaria, tuberculosis, or severe pain might be given morphine or quinine — but with wildly inconsistent dosing. One prescription could help; the next could poison.

Dr. Abbott couldn’t accept that. Trained in the new science of alkaloids — the active chemical compounds in medicinal plants — he believed patients deserved better than guesswork. He envisioned a future where medicine was precise, standardized, and safe.

So, in a cramped room above his practice, Dr. Abbott turned part scientist, part entrepreneur. He began crafting tiny “dosimetric granules” — measured doses of purified alkaloids in pellet form — so that every patient got the right amount of medicine every time. It was a small but revolutionary idea: take the uncertainty out of medicine by putting science at the center.

Word spread fast among Chicago’s doctors. Within just a few years, they were lining up for Abbott’s precise pills — no more mixing powders by hand, no more gambling with patients’ lives. By 1894, Abbott’s one-man lab had grown into the Abbott Alkaloidal Company. From that small Chicago back room, his standardized medications soon reached hospitals and pharmacies nationwide.

For Dr. Abbott, this was never just a business — it was a mission: healthcare should be consistent, reliable, and grounded in rigorous science. That spirit still runs through Abbott’s DNA today, more than 135 years later. From those first granules to diagnostic tests, nutrition products, and life-changing medical devices, the goal remains the same: make healthcare better, more precise, and more accessible to everyone.

🔬 Segment 2: Innovating through Decades

Through the 1900s, Abbott didn’t just survive — it reinvented itself again and again, evolving from a tiny Chicago alkaloid maker to a global giant that touched nearly every corner of healthcare.

By the time the 1920s roared in, the Abbott Alkaloidal Company had already shown it could do more than sell standardized pills. It was building laboratories, hiring chemists and pharmacists, and leaning hard into research — an unusual approach for a company of its size at the time. This ambition set the stage for its next big leap: going public.

Unfortunately around the same time in 1921, Wallace Abbott passed at age 63 but the company Abbott continued to grow. In 1922, Abbott moved from Ravenswood to the North Chicago site which still remains today.

In 1929, just months before the stock market crash that triggered the Great Depression, Abbott Laboratories made its debut on the Chicago Stock Exchange, with an offering of 20,000 shares at $32 per share. The decision to offer shares to the public was a bold one — opening the company to outside investors gave Abbott fresh capital to expand its manufacturing capacity and research pipeline, just as demand for scientifically reliable medicines was growing fast.

The timing wasn’t easy. The economic turmoil of the 1930s forced Abbott, like so many, to tighten belts and innovate to survive. But the IPO laid the financial foundation that would fuel the company’s biggest breakthroughs for decades to come.

By the 1940s, that capital — and Abbott’s growing technical expertise — positioned it perfectly when World War II created a new global medical emergency. Infectious disease was ravaging soldiers more than bullets were. Abbott became a key U.S. government partner, one of a handful of companies tasked with mass-producing penicillin — then a revolutionary new antibiotic. Their industrial-scale production lines delivered millions of doses to Allied troops, dramatically lowering battlefield deaths from infected wounds and pneumonia.

The war effort cemented Abbott’s reputation as a company that could turn frontier science into real-world impact, fast. And it didn’t stop there.

In the booming postwar decades, Abbott kept evolving with medicine itself:

1950s-60s: Abbott expanded internationally, opened new R&D labs, and became a leader in anesthetics and intravenous solutions. They broke new ground in diagnostics too — launching their first diagnostic test in the 1960s, a hepatitis assay that helped make blood transfusions safer.
1960s: Abbott saw that health was bigger than just pills and tests. In 1964, Abbott Laboratories, announced plans to acquire the M. R. Dietetic Laboratories of Columbus, Ohio, for $43 million of unissued, but authorized stock. This is also a major pivotal moment since this acquisition catapulted Abbott to become an important company in the nutrition space. Over the next decades, brands like Ensure and Pedialyte became trusted staples in homes, hospitals, and emergency rooms worldwide.
1970s: Abbott took a lead in immunoassay technology — using antibodies to detect minuscule amounts of viruses, hormones, and proteins in blood. These platforms made early, reliable diagnosis possible for countless conditions, from thyroid disease to infectious threats like HIV.
1985: Abbott’s HIV antibody test became one of the first approved diagnostic tests for the virus in the U.S., a crucial tool during the AIDS crisis when accurate detection was vital to stop transmission.

As the millennium turned, Abbott’s diversification accelerated: they developed heart stents, invested in point-of-care testing for faster results at the bedside, and built a growing diabetes care business that included glucose monitoring technology for millions living with diabetes.

In 2013, Abbott pulled off one of the biggest moves in its history — spinning off its proprietary pharmaceutical division into a new company called AbbVie. AbbVie inherited blockbuster drugs like Humira, while Abbott sharpened its focus on diagnostics, nutrition, generic medicines, and advanced medical devices. This split let both companies grow faster in their own lanes: AbbVie into a pharma powerhouse, Abbott into a global leader in diagnostics and devices.

When COVID-19 struck in 2020, Abbott was once again ready to meet the moment. The company launched some of the first rapid COVID-19 tests used worldwide, delivering billions of diagnostic results and helping communities manage an unpredictable virus in real time.

Today, more than 135 years since Dr. Wallace Calvin Abbott first hand-pressed dosimetric granules above his Chicago practice, Abbott operates in over 160 countries. Its name is found in emergency rooms, clinics, labs, and family kitchens alike — proof that the vision Dr. Abbott laid out in 1888 is still alive: medicine should be precise, consistent, and accessible for all.

💉 Segment 3: The Modern Era — From Diabetes to COVID

By the early 2000s, Abbott had quietly grown into a healthcare powerhouse — a name you might not see in headlines every day, but one deeply woven into millions of lives around the world. They were big in medical nutrition — think Ensure for seniors and Pedialyte for kids — and they dominated diagnostics, generic pharmaceuticals, and medical devices. But there was one health crisis that Abbott saw as both a huge challenge and a chance to truly change lives: diabetes.

Back then, for millions of people living with diabetes, daily life revolved around the dreaded finger prick. To monitor their blood sugar, patients had to jab their fingertips multiple times a day, squeeze out a drop of blood, and test it on a strip. It was painful, inconvenient, and easy to skip — but skipping came with huge risks. Unchecked blood sugar swings could mean hospital visits, organ damage, or worse.

Abbott’s scientists and engineers knew there had to be a better way. They envisioned a world where managing diabetes could be less intrusive and more empowering. That vision became the FreeStyle Libre — a tiny, coin-sized sensor worn on the back of the arm. Instead of finger sticks, the Libre continuously measures glucose levels just under the skin and sends the data wirelessly to your phone or reader. People could finally see their blood sugar trends in real time, spot dangerous highs and lows before they happened, and take back control — without the daily pain and hassle.

When Abbott launched the Libre in 2014, it was revolutionary. Many experts were skeptical: Would patients trust it? Could it really replace finger pricks? But by word of mouth and proven results, the Libre took off. Today, it’s the world’s most widely used continuous glucose monitoring system — with more than 5 million users in over 60 countries. For many, it’s not just a device — it’s freedom. It’s fewer complications. It’s years added to life expectancy.

Then came an unexpected test that shook the entire world — COVID-19. Virtually overnight, the global demand for fast, reliable testing skyrocketed. Abbott, with its deep roots in diagnostics, moved at lightning speed. They launched BinaxNOW — a rapid, at-home antigen test that gave results in just 15 minutes. It was affordable, easy to use, and produced at a massive scale.

By the height of the pandemic, Abbott was producing billions of tests, helping schools reopen safely, businesses stay afloat, and families gather when isolation seemed endless. In many ways, it was a reminder of what Abbott does best: quiet innovation that meets people where they are, often when they need it most.

From pain-free diabetes care to pandemic-scale diagnostics, Abbott shows how big companies can stay relevant — and even indispensable — by solving real, human problems with practical, life-changing technology.

👶 Nutrition and Devices — Beyond Tests

Nutrition remains one of Abbott’s pillars. Brands like Similac and Ensure feed vulnerable babies, athletes, elderly patients, and people recovering from illness every day. Despite challenges — like the recent infant formula shortage in the U.S. — Abbott’s nutrition business remains a lifeline for millions of families globally. Similac, introduced in the 1920s, was one of the first infant formulas designed to be closer to breast milk, and it’s become a trusted name for generations of parents. Ensure, launched in the 1970s, was one of the first ready-to-drink complete nutritional shakes — now prescribed in hospitals and used at home to help patients maintain strength during illness or aging.

Their heart device division is equally impactful. In 2017, Abbott Laboratories acquired St. Jude Medical for approximately $25 billion — a move that significantly expanded Abbott’s presence in the cardiovascular and neuromodulation markets. Abbott became a leader in heart valves, pacemakers, and electrophysiology tools that keep hearts beating and lives moving. Their MitraClip device, for example, helps repair leaky heart valves without open-heart surgery — transforming outcomes for patients too fragile for major operations. Abbott’s philosophy here mirrors its diagnostics mindset: make high-quality tech that’s widely available and safe.

Another standout device is the FreeStyle Libre, Abbott’s game-changing continuous glucose monitor (CGM) for people with diabetes. Launched in Europe in 2014 and approved in the U.S. in 2017, FreeStyle Libre replaced finger-stick blood sugar checks with a small sensor worn on the arm that lets users scan their glucose levels with a reader or smartphone. Today, millions worldwide rely on FreeStyle Libre for real-time insights that help them manage their diabetes more easily and independently.

In diagnostics, Abbott’s ID NOW platform became widely known during the COVID-19 pandemic. Originally developed for rapid flu and strep testing, ID NOW gained emergency use authorization for COVID-19 in 2020 — delivering positive results in as little as five minutes. The platform highlighted Abbott’s agility in scaling molecular diagnostics to meet global crises while supporting routine care in clinics, urgent care centers, and remote settings.

Across nutrition, diagnostics, and medical devices, Abbott’s products share a common thread: practical innovation that reaches people where they are — whether that’s a neonatal unit, a rural clinic, or an athlete’s training table.

👥 Segment 4: The People and Purpose

Abbott’s global workforce is 114,000 strong — an army of scientists, engineers, factory workers, and field representatives spread across more than 160 countries. Many of these employees work close to the communities they serve. In sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia, for example, Abbott has invested heavily in affordable point-of-care (POC) diagnostic tools — simple, rugged devices that can test for HIV, malaria, or tuberculosis in remote clinics where a modern lab might be hundreds of miles away. For some families, this means the difference between early treatment and silent tragedy.

One key figure behind Abbott’s modern trajectory is Robert Ford, who became CEO in 2020 — right as COVID-19 began to reshape daily life around the globe. Ford’s journey to the top of Abbott is a testament to how global and mission-driven the company’s culture really is. He was born in Brazil and grew up there, giving him firsthand insight into the unique health challenges faced by developing and emerging markets. Ford studied at Boston College, where he earned his undergraduate degree in communications and economics, and later earned an MBA from the University of California, Berkeley.

He joined Abbott back in 1996, starting in diabetes care — long before the FreeStyle Libre would disrupt how millions monitor their blood sugar. Ford worked his way up through Abbott’s diagnostic and medical device divisions, helping launch and expand critical products that shaped the company’s growth. His big-picture thinking and pragmatic approach became especially visible during the pandemic, when Abbott ramped up rapid COVID-19 tests at an unprecedented scale — helping keep communities open and families connected at a time of global uncertainty.

As CEO, Ford continues to champion Abbott’s core mission: practical, scalable solutions that make life better for as many people as possible. He often talks about creating “life-changing technology that’s accessible, not just advanced” — an idea deeply rooted in his international upbringing and his early work bringing healthcare innovations to diverse communities.

Abbott’s culture reflects that same mindset: practical, patient-first, and grounded in real-world impact. They don’t chase moonshot cures — they build systems that can reach billions. And through the Abbott Fund, they back that mission with millions in community health partnerships, nutrition education, and disaster relief around the world. From remote clinics in Kenya to hurricane-hit towns in the U.S., Abbott shows what happens when a quiet giant focuses on solving everyday problems — and makes healthcare better for everyone, everywhere.

🏆 Segment 5: Lessons from Abbott

What lessons can we take from Abbott?

📌 Consistency wins — 135 years in business shows that steady innovation can build trust that lasts generations.

📌 Scale amplifies impact — whether it’s FreeStyle Libre sensors or COVID tests, Abbott’s global reach means solutions that touch billions, not thousands.

📌 Practical beats flashy — instead of chasing the next big hype cycle, Abbott focuses on making everyday healthcare safer, cheaper, and more reliable.

🔮 Segment 6: What’s Next for Abbott?

So where does Abbott go from here?

They’re doubling down on next-gen diagnostics — including AI-powered lab systems that spot diseases faster and more accurately. They’re expanding the Libre diabetes tech into sensors that work even longer and connect to smart insulin pumps.

In heart care, they’re testing new minimally invasive devices that could replace open surgery for millions more people. And they’re exploring how to make tests and treatments more sustainable — cutting healthcare’s carbon footprint as global demand rises.

Today, Abbott’s stock price hovers around $115, with a market cap at $220 billion. Its impact? Immeasurable. Millions of people live longer, healthier, freer lives because of everyday Abbott solutions. A Ph.D. salary at Abbott Laboratories in the United States typically ranges from $108,000 to $158,000 per year, with an average of $114,000. Abbott has locations in over 160 countries. The company employs 114,000 people worldwide. Abbott's corporate headquarters is in Abbott Park, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago.

🎵 Outro

And that’s it for this episode of Petri Dish Perspectives: Biotech Unleashed.

From Dr. Abbott’s tiny Chicago pills to the global COVID tests and glucose sensors changing daily life — Abbott reminds us that the true measure of biotech isn’t just the headlines, but the everyday tools that keep people healthy around the world.

If you enjoyed this episode, please hit subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a friend who’s curious about how health tech shapes our lives behind the scenes.

Got a company you’d like me to cover next? Drop me a message and I’d love to hear from you.

Until then — stay curious and keep an eye out for next episode coming on Thursday! Thanks for listening and see you next time!

References

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Manead Khin

Host