John Simpson: Reluctant Entrepreneur

John Simpson never set out to be a physician and still does not consider himself a businessman; yet he is a leading interventional cardiologist and has launched more than a half dozen successful device companies. Simpson takes pride in building successful teams, enabling him to delegate the engineering and business responsibilities to others, while focusing on what he does best: figuring out how to better treat the patient. He is perhaps best known for developing over-the-wire angioplasty through his first company, ACS, and has followed that with companies involved with ultrasound (CVIS), atherectomy (DVI and Fox Hollow), vascular closure (Perclose), and chronic total occlusions (LuMend). Simpson remains iconoclastic when it comes to patient care issues. So although angioplasty is where he made his name, he remains suspicious of stents and hopes through his current venture, Fox Hollow, to minimize their use.