Cancer's answer

By Donna Bailey Nurse
Photography by Edward Gajdel

CA Mark lievonen is president of Canada's biggest vaccine maker. He's leading the search to find a cure for one of humanity's most frightening illnesses

On a typical weekday morning J. Mark Lievonen steps out of his comfortably elegant home in Unionville, Ont., and slips into his midnight blue 2001 Saab SE convertible. He drives south down Kennedy Road to Highway 407 then along Bathurst to Steeles. If he is lucky and beats the traffic, by 7:15 he will arrive at the offices of Canada's largest vaccine producer. Once inside, the president of Aventis Pasteur Ltd., the Canadian arm of Aventis Pasteur, grabs a cup of coffee and a quick breakfast at the cafeteria before making his way to his spacious office. On this particular day, he takes a two-hour conference call with his boss, Wayne Pisano, executive vice-president of commercial operations for Aventis Pasteur worldwide. Joining them on the line are the presidents of Aventis Pasteur International and Aventis Pasteur US. Given that Canada makes up only 2% of the pharmaceutical market, it tickles Lievonen to think that the Canadian branch is on an equal footing with the Europeans and the Americans. "That, in itself, reveals a lot about the unique position of this company," he says.

Aventis Pasteur Canada is part of an international operation that employs some 8,000 people worldwide, 1,100 of them in Canada. Founded in 1914 as Connaught Laboratories, it was acquired by Institut Mérieux in 1989 and was part of a 1999 merger that formed Aventis SA, an international conglomerate that generates more than 17.6 billion euros ($26.6 billion) annually. Aventis Pasteur Ltd. (Canada) now distributes vaccines to combat 17 diseases, including the flu. But the company is best known for Pentacel, a childhood vaccine that provides single-injection protection against five diseases, including pertussis, polio, Hib (haemophilus influenza b), diphtheria and tetanus. Researched and developed wholly in Canada, Pentacel was launched in 1997 and commands 100% of the Canadian pediatric market.

In Canada Aventis Pasteur occupies 50 acres on the northern fringes of Toronto, along with two floors at Sunnybrook Medical Centre, where much of the research takes place. And this past summer, Aventis Pasteur opened a state of the art facility to house Lievonen's pet project: a cancer vaccine program. "We are a company that deals with preventing diseases and saving lives," says Lievonen. "For the past 15 years we have been working on a vaccine for HIV. And now, when you look at an area like cancer, we will also be treating disease. We feel that we are making a difference in the world."

Lievonen sounds like one of those impassioned Doctors Without Borders. But he is not a medical professional. He is a CA. Lievonen's circuitous route to the presidency of one of Canada's most respected pharmaceutical companies describes a steep and unique learning curve, incorporating finance, marketing, health and science. According to Lievonen, his CA training has supported him every step of the way.

"I can't speak highly enough about my CA education," he says. "The general business training [it] provides is far greater than most people realize. It has given me the ability to reason, the ability to assess, the ability to strategize. It's tremendous." 

Hired by Coopers & Lybrand in 1979 — after graduating from York University with a BBA — Lievonen earned his CA designation in 1981. He spent the next two years in the firm's tax department and, in 1983, Connaught Laboratories invited him to join their treasury department. (Also, in 1984, Lievonen returned to York University and earned an MBA in marketing finance, which he completed in 1987.) Connaught had been one of Lievonen's clients at Coopers & Lybrand, where he had also audited McNeil Laboratories. "I just happened to be in the pharmaceutical industry by default," he says. And he readily admits he wasn't the world's best tax accountant. "I prefer the big picture," he says. Still, Lievonen must have been doing something right, because in 1988, when he was just 32, he was appointed corporate vice-president of finance. Lievonen was ecstatic with the promotion. "I felt tremendous," he remembers. "It had always been one of my goals to be vice-president of finance."

But 1990 was his watershed year. That's when Lievonen was named senior vice-president of commercial development and administration. He was now responsible for both Canadian and international sales and marketing. He went from a background in finance to running marketing and sales. "I remember going home and telling my wife, Lori, about my new job," he recalls. "She said, 'but you're an CA, and you have nothing to do with finance anymore?' She started laughing and I could hardly keep a straight face myself."

Lievonen's CA training provided him with the confidence to make the transition smoothly. "It's that broad finance training and business analytical skills that one can apply to many situations," he explains. "Let's say I am presented with a proposal around the discontinuation of a product or a price change or a distribution agreement somebody wants to sign. Or say somebody comes in here with a business analysis. If the person has done a really appropriate job around the objectives, the alternatives and the recommendation, I'll use my big picture skills to assess the plan and we can be done in three and a half minutes. On the other hand, if the analysis is poor, then I can focus in on the details. I will drill down and drill down and send the person away to try again."

Lievonen stands five foot eleven. He wears wire-rimmed glasses and has gray hair that in bright sunlight glints blonde. At 47, he has the kind of features that promise never to age and a manner to match: loquacious and enthusiastic, Lievonen radiates energy.

Indeed, he comes across as so young and unpretentious, so frankly nice that his superiors once worried he might not have the leadership mettle required to rally the troops and move the company forward. They didn't need to be concerned. "Mark's boyishness is not really an issue," says Nancy Simpson, Aventis Pasteur Ltd.'s manager of external communications. "He's got a very serious side. He really gets down to business very quickly. I can generally determine what mood he's in by what he is wearing. I prefer to meet with him when he's in a polo shirt than when he is wearing a shirt that is starched and white. Believe me, there's a real difference."

Lievonen has given some thought to what makes for effective leadership since his elevation to the presidency in March, 1999. "I used to work on developing an external kind of toughness," he admits. "But now I say to myself that it's good to be positive, firm, fair and respectful. I usually find I can send a stronger message when I need to by just doing it in a very calm way."

By any standard, Lievonen's approach to business has been an indefatigable success. Besides holding the position of president, he is a member of Aventis Pasteur's global commercial operations management, a group that consists of the presidents of the three main parts of the company — the American, Canadian and French — who get together to plot Aventis Pasteur's global strategy. He's on the board of directors of BIOTECanada, director of the Ontario Genomics Institute, and a cabinet member of the United Way of Greater Toronto, chairing its healthcare division. "What impresses people most about Lievonen," says Janet Lambert, president of BIOTECanada, the association that represents the country's biotechnology firms, "is his leadership skills. He is well known and respected throughout the industry. He's a champion of the industry."

Lievonen's impressive career has not been won at the expense of family. He has striven tirelessly to recreate for his children — Holly, 13, and Jeff, 18 — the security and support he fondly remembers from his own suburban Toronto upbringing. Lievonen was born in Rexdale, Ont., in 1956 and looks back at a childhood that was traditional and happy, very "Leave it to Beaver." His father, a marketing manager, and homemaker mother indulged a typical Canadian kid's love of sports, especially hockey. Unfortunately, he was not much of a skater, and by his teens, he turned to more cerebral pursuits. He played in a band, The Pink Elephant, before more serious academic interests took hold (the band lasted about a year).

He did have a unique passion as a teen: business. While most young men his age were flipping through comic books and watching horror flicks, Lievonen was devouring The Wall Street Journal. He was mesmerized by business and political novels. "Business resonated with me," he says. "I don't know why. Even now, business magazines are pleasurable things for me to read: learning about people and what they have created."

Lievonen excelled in school, graduating third in his class and winning a scholarship to York University. If he had any thoughts of sowing a few wild oats at York, they were quickly dismissed on the first day of orientation. He was stopped in his tracks by Lori Walters, a drama major and the woman who would become his wife.

Lievonen had always envisioned a career in corporate law. But while in his third year at York, studying business, he attended a career seminar that altered this plan. A chartered accountant from Price Waterhouse was on hand to address the students. "I was quite stimulated by what this individual had to say," Lievonen recalls. "He talked about the career options for CAs, the potential income, the exposure to different opportunities. I thought, 'I can go to law school and it will take me three more years, and if I do well I'll get an articling position. And then if I do well I might get to work somewhere. On the other hand, I could study to become a chartered accountant and pretty much have my choice of firms.' "

He was right. After graduation, Lievonen landed interviews with 12 accounting firms and was offered 10 jobs. Coopers & Lybrand's north Toronto office was a perfect fit. Lievonen is a man of dizzying global ambitions, yet steadfast in maintaining the middle-class values that have served him so well. A devoted family man, he has tried to secure a settled lifestyle for his growing family. Last year, he took time off from work to join his daughter on a school camping trip and found time one year to coach three baseball teams, one for his daughter, and two for his son.

"It's important," he says. "My parents always showed up to watch my games. At the time it was like, 'Don't stand out so much.' I mean, my parents were always there. But when I look back on it, it was great. So that work/life balance has been important to me right from the beginning. I try my best to manage it."

By 1995 there was a great deal to balance in Lievonen's day-to-day life. He was on the verge of spearheading one of the most ambitious projects in Aventis Pasteur's history: the research and development of a cancer vaccine. "Mark, along with a scientist named Michel Klein, had the original vision for the cancer program," says Irene Marson, director of oncology business at Aventis Pasteur. "And Mark made it happen."

Aventis Pasteur had started debating the possibility of developing a cancer vaccine after the success of BCG, a therapy that proved effective in the treatment of superficial bladder cancer. Lievonen, in charge of commercial operations at the time, was asked to lead a strategic review to determine whether it made any sense to parcel BCG into its own company.

At the same time, in a laboratory in Troy, NY, Virogenetics Corp., a company affiliated with Aventis Pasteur, was developing another cancer vaccine technology. Lievonen's review suggested that BCG was too narrow a platform for a spinoff and the entire vaccine technology needed to be considered. The trick for Lievonen was to transfer this cutting-edge research to Canada. He had long envisioned establishing a full-fledged cancer vaccine facility on the Connaught campus of Aventis Pasteur in Toronto. If he could pull this off, Aventis Pasteur would become an industry leader in one stroke.

On the other hand, not everyone at Aventis Pasteur embraced the idea of the cancer program. "Some people thought it was a great idea," Lievonen recalls. "But others didn't want to hear about it. They felt we had enough on our plates dealing with infectious diseases."

One of Lievonen's particular gifts is his ability to pull disparate groups together. "This is important in an industry that develops everything from canola to vaccines to discovering a cure for Parkinson's to methods of cleaning up oil spills," explains Lambert. And Lievonen knew how to cut to the chase, to bring everyone together for a focused analysis of the looming challenge. All that was at stake were the lives of millions of cancer sufferers and the fate of several hundred million dollars in research funding.

"There were two main questions," Lievonen says. Should Aventis Pasteur be involved in cancer vaccines in the first place? Success might be some way off, but the financial cost of such groundbreaking research and development would be great and immediate. If Aventis Pasteur decided to take the risk, where should it locate the program? The US has the largest pharmaceutical market in the world, France claims a large number of skilled researchers and all three countries have facilities for clinical studies.

"After a lot of analysis and discussion," Lievonen says, "we decided Aventis Pasteur should go into cancer vaccines and that we should do it in Canada."

The key to winning acceptance for bringing the program to Toronto turned out to be a financial commitment from the federal government, which was willing to contribute substantial funding through a federal agency called Technology Partnerships Canada. Aventis Pasteur would be spending a whopping $350 million over 10 years, but Technology Partnerships Canada promised to ease the pain, contributing $60 million over the same period.

In June 1997, then prime minister Jean Chrétien officially announced the agreement at a news conference held at Aventis Pasteur's Toronto offices. Lievonen was appointed senior vice-president and general manager of the oncology business unit. He was now charged with finding a cost-effective way of transferring the cancer program from Troy to Toronto. He settled on a most excellent plan. Cutting right to the chase, he helped convince Jim Tartaglia, a chief inventor of the made-in-the-USA technology, to come to Canada.

"It was an example of the reverse brain drain," Lievonen says. "We had challenges bringing a leading US scientist to a better position here. It took a lot of effort around remuneration and special incentives. The Canadian government likes to talk about the innovation agenda. But at Aventis Pasteur we really live it."

Tartaglia, vice-president of research and development, arrived in Toronto in January 1999. "I wanted to come because I'd been part of the organization since 1990," says Tartaglia, "and because I had invested my scientific career in the development of recombinant vaccines for infectious disease and cancer. That, coupled with the involvement of technology Partnerships Canada. I was also excited about the research team we would be building at Aventis Pasteur." 

Lievonen's new cancer vaccine facility employs 50 scientists busily researching and developing a therapeutic vaccine that will help strengthen the body's immune system — a crucial step in fighting the disease. To date, the program has produced two candidate vaccines — one to treat colorectal cancer and another to fight melanoma. They are currently in phase one/ two clinical trials in humans. "What we are looking for," Lievonen says, "is safety and the ability to stimulate an immune response. Once you have that, you move to phase three, which is where you really start looking for a clinical benefit or efficacy over the next few years."

Under Lievonen's steady hand, Aventis Pasteur has fulfilled its promise as an industry leader in vaccine research and development. But this laudable goal does not compare to what truly spurs him on. "Many people forget about the diseases that were scourges of mankind," he submits. "Polio in the '50s was absolutely devastating. We've gotten complacent about immunization. It has been so successful that people no longer recognize the need." Lievonen's mission is to ensure the general public understands this need will always be present and stay alert to the possible reappearance of any number of diseases. "A few years ago," he offers as an example, "there was an issue over whooping cough vaccine — it was being linked to certain disorders. Some communities in the US and England stopped vaccinating and there was a resurgence of the disease."

Sadly, Lievonen has seen even more spectacular and devastating evidence to support his near-evangelical call for vigilance and continued research. "Today, SARS and the West Nile virus are bringing infectious diseases back into our consciousness," he says.

Lievonen is all attention, never wavering. Aventis Pasteur will continue to support the necessary cutting-edge science combating these new assaults and Mark Lievonen will be there, front and centre — even on those tough days when he may also be happily compelled to book a little extra family time, maybe go on a few more school field trips and dance competitions with his daughter or helping his son balance his academic and musical interests, or maybe even find time for a round of golf. He'll manage.

Donna Bailey Nurse is a freelance writer in Toronto