Frank Pompei  is founder and CEO of Exergen, a maker of scanners, thermometers, and sensors. He credits his MIT education with equipping him to build a successful company, mindful of the possibilities created by his financial aid package. “My parents could never have sent me to MIT on their wages as factory workers,” he says. 

Thriving at MIT and beyond. “I remember the academics as challenging but always interesting and, in some ways, fun,” says Frank. “Inventing came easily for me, and MIT prepared me well.” Today, he holds more than 70 US patents, and Exergen’s signature temporal thermometer is powered by an infrared scanner he developed and patented after years of experimentation and study.