It’s a wonderful thing when a qualified leader with lofty, yet doable, goals takes the reins of an already successful enterprise. His thoughts and plans to make the institution even better are already swimming through his intelligent, highly educated and experienced brain when he walks through the front door.
That’s exactly what’s happening at LABioMed (adjacent to Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Torrance). As of Sept. 1, David I. Meyer, PhD, is the new president and CEO of one of the South Bay’s biggest employers and one of the nation’s most respected science and medicine research firms. LABioMed was founded 56 years ago, employs 150 researchers (known as “investigators” in the science world), and is presently involved in over 1,000 ongoing studies. It is associated with the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. Meyer replaces Carole Wagner Vallianos, esq., who has been serving for a year as interim president and CEO after the retirement of Ken Trevett.
Members of the selection team who chose Meyer are openly excited about his appointment. Said Rick Higgins, president of LABioMed Foundation:
“We were very fortunate to find and hire David. His background was nearly a perfect fit for the organization. David has both the intelligence and personality to move LABioMed forward as a premier medical research facility.
“With the current economic climate, he is going to be challenged. Under David’s leadership, our goal is to create a more effective and collaborative working environment for our researchers. Fundraising is another aspect of David’s position and, over the next few years, we hope to strengthen our financial position.
“David is a great asset for LABioMed and we are exciting to begin working with him on future challenges.”
Meyer, 61, earned his undergraduate and doctoral degrees at UCLA, and this latest move for the Palos Verdes Estates resident brings him full circle. His journey has covered many miles and many research projects around the world. After earning his PhD in Westwood, he moved to Switzerland, then established his own research team in Heidelberg, Germany.
Why such faraway places?
“When you finish your PhD, there’s no way in this day and age – or even in that day and age – that you could just go and get a university position at a top research university without first doing post-doctoral research,” said Meyer. “So, I wrote to four fairly well-known, important people to ask if they would take me into their lab as a trainee, and one who I was most interested in said ‘sure.’ I was halfway out the door to go to Princeton and he wrote me a letter – in those days it was letters – telling me he had just taken a job in Switzerland and would I mind coming with him.
“I’m thinking to myself, hmmmm, New Jersey or Switzerland? There was not a lot of discussion there. So, I had my post-doctoral position and also became an instructor at the University of Basel. I wanted to go for two years, I ended up staying for five, and then I moved to Heidelberg because there was a brand new lab that had opened, the European Molecular Biology Laboratory. It’s a state-of-the-art lab funded by 10 European countries at the time – now it’s more – from their federal budgets with the idea of giving young scientists a sort of sandbox to work in for five to 10 years to build up their careers and then go back to their home countries.
“Here I was as an American, and I went there first as a staff scientist and two years later they promoted me to a research group lead, which was most unusual. But they were interested in what I was doing and I would be able to train people there from any of a dozen European countries… Then I decided I wasn’t going to live the rest of my life in Europe, so after eight years in Heidelberg I took a position at UCLA in the medical school.”
Meyer’s graduate studies were in biochemistry. At Heidelberg, his research centered on cell biology. Upon returning to UCLA, he continued his work in cell biology.
At the time of this interview, Meyer had been on the job at LABioMed for one month. He said he faced some surprises in his first days on campus, but was undaunted.
“There are always things that are unexpected,” he said. “These are issues that plague research institutes large and small to lesser or greater extents. I think it’s something my bag of tricks will hopefully enable me to deal with. So, yeah, there were a lot of surprises but none of them are things that are new to me.”
Having been associated with UCLA in various capacities – from student to researcher to teacher – Meyer is most aware of the workings of LABioMed.
“As a faculty member and researcher in the school of medicine, I came down here on occasion to lecture,” he said. “Although, I have to say, even though there’s the name UCLA on the Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, and even though most of the investigators at LABioMed have UCLA faculty appointments, the actual connections between UCLA Westwood and LABioMed are not nearly what they could or should be. That’s one of my goals, to strengthen collaborative research relationships between investigators here and in Westwood.
“There are many areas where they excel in Westwood and are clearly better than what we do. But I’m also proud to say there are many areas down here where we actually have greater strength than you would find in Westwood. Therefore, better relationships with Westwood would be a very synergistic and a win-win situation.”
Meyer has specific ideas about how to achieve this and other goals he has set for LABioMed.
“The immediate thing I have to do is create a very communicative and transparent administration,” said Meyer. “Our second major goal is to establish an environment that fosters inter-disciplinary collaboration between some very strong research groups here on campus. I think it’s through collaboration of this nature that the next generation of scientific breakthroughs are going to come.”
LABioMed has an international reputation of entertaining a vast number of research projects underway simultaneously.
“Our research spans the whole spectrum of disciplines — areas of medical study from prenatal to aging and everything in between,” said Meyer. “We investigate all of the various systems; nephrology to cardiology, infectious diseases and just on and on. We include Emergency Medicine, which is not widely studied, and we have ongoing research in just about every department. Every Harbor-UCLA department has a research program…”
Though his background is in research, Meyer’s recent positions – including his latest job as executive vice president of the House Ear Institute in L.A. – have been heavy on the administrative side. Will LABioMed allow the time for personal research projects?
“You know, I gave that up,” said Meyer. “I published my last paper in January of this year and I have no laboratory or employees or research funds. I am purely here to serve the investigators. There’s no conflict of interest.”
Meyer and his wife, Evi, met in Switzerland when he was involved in his post-graduate work. Evi, a native Swiss, is an educator at Cabrillo Marine Aquarium. They moved to PV Estates in 1999. The Meyers have two children, both of whom graduated from PV High and are presently studying at UC Berkeley. Daughter Susana (Susie) is a junior pursuing a double major in American Studies and Media Studies. Son Daniel, a freshman, is interested in exploring the business world.
Does the new job require 14-hour days at the office?
“You know what, it’s so much nicer to be so close to home that I don’t even mind the long days,” said Meyer. “I save all that time when I was sitting in my car driving downtown that I can now spend either at work or at home.”
