He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in biology from Quinnipiac University in 1971.
He joined the company as a sales representative for the McNeil Pharmaceutical division in 1971 and eventually became the head of Johnson & Johnson's Ethicon Endo-Surgery business in 1992.
As CEO, Weldon engineered some of the largest acquisitions in the company's history including the purchase of Alza and Pfizer's consumer-health product line.
[4][5] In 2009, he earned a total compensation of $22,830,834, which included a base salary of $1,802,500, a cash bonus of $12,831,146, stock awards of $2,762,532, option awards of $5,238,069, and other compensation of $196,587.
[7] Additionally, as of 2013, his story was a case study at the Leadership & Corporate Accountability course at Harvard Business School.