About Tom
Tom Wiggans was born and raised in Fredonia in Wilson County, Kansas where his father and grandfather operated Wiggans Drugstore. Growing up in a town like Fredonia gave Tom a clear understanding of the importance of hard work, personal sacrifice and community values. Tom’s grandfather ran the drug store everyday from 7 am until 11 pm. Oftentimes, families were unable to pay for their medicine and the Wiggans family simply kept track of the charges, knowing they would be paid once the harvest season arrived. The Wiggans family belonged to the First Methodist Church, where Tom was baptized, sang in the youth choir, and received his God and Country award and Eagle Scout Award. Beginning at age 13, Tom always held a summer job including mowing lawns around town, working for the city and local cement plant, hauling hay, and being a life guard at the Fredonia City Pool.
Tom’s introduction to public service occurred in 1967 when he served as a Page to Representative Clyde Hill from Yates Center, Kansas. From that moment on he knew he wanted to someday serve Kansas himself. Following graduation from Fredonia High School, Tom attended the University of Kansas where he received a Bachelor’s Degree in Pharmacy. He has spent his career starting and leading various bioscience and pharmaceutical companies throughout the United States and Europe, creating hundreds of jobs while developing new treatments for couples battling infertility, and new products to treat diseases such as heart disease, Lou Gehrig’s disease, and kidney, liver, and skin cancers. He has developed a reputation in the bioscience industry as a talented manager and leader.
Tom is committed to applying his vast business experience to Kansas state government as our next Governor. By utilizing his common-sense business practices to bring people together and solve problems, Tom will work with both democrats and republicans to pull our state out of the economic recession, ensure we have a stable state budget and create 21st century jobs for our future growth.
Tom has been involved in many non-profit organizations, serving as a member of the Kansas Innovation Consortium, a gubernatorial-appointed group of business leaders in Kansas who are working to stimulate economic development through innovation and entrepreneurship. He is an advisor to the Institute for Advancing Medical Innovation at the University of Kansas Medical Center and he is a member of the Advisory Board of Heartland Bioventures, the venture capital arm of the Kansas Bioscience Authority. He is also a member the Board of Trustees of the University of Kansas Endowment Association.
He has been a member of the Board of Overseers of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, and has been an active participant in political and economic policy issues at the Institution.
Tom was most recently Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board of Peplin, Inc., a bioscience company developing a product for skin cancer and other serious skin diseases. Peplin, Inc. was recently acquired by LEO Pharma of Copenhagen Denmark.
In 1994, Tom joined Connetics Corporation as the company’s ninth employee and first Chief Executive Officer. During his tenure as CEO, Connetics grew from a start-up company to one of the leading dermatology companies in the United States, employing over 400 people. In October of 2006, Connetics merged with Stiefel Laboratories and became the largest independent dermatology company in the world.
Prior to starting Connetics, Tom was President of CytoTherapeutics, a company developing therapies for diabetes and Parkinson’s disease, and before that served in various marketing and management positions with the pharmaceutical company Ares-Serono Group. As President of Serono U.S., Tom helped create more than 200 jobs.
Tom began his career with Eli Lilly & Company where he held sales and marketing positions.
Tom has also been involved in many groups that support the advancement of bioscience to improve human life. He currently serves as Chairman of the Board of the Biotechnology Institute, a non-profit organization based in Washington, D.C which is committed to improving science education in the United States. He was instrumental in the founding of the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) in 1993, and served on BIO’s Board of Directors and its Executive Committee until 2004. He has also served on the Advisory Board of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies in Washington DC.
Tom, who lives in Olathe, is married to Kathryn Wiggans, a nurse, and they have two teenage daughters, Liz and Amanda.
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