“Rest of World” is a category built for spreadsheets, not for history. This issue looks at the geographies erased by that label, and the people writing their next chapter in life sciences capability, one built from the ground up.
Sammy Ogunjimi wanted to bring Merck to Nigeria with him. When they offered a distributorship instead, he built his own army — factories, guidelines, an academy — piece by piece, problem by problem.
At twenty, Haşim Solmaz bought a domain for a standard he hadn’t yet learned. Sixteen years, a national society, and an international chairmanship later, he’s still the same thing he always was — a teacher at heart.
He calls calibration a promise: an instrument tested in Buenos Aires should read the same as one in California. Jason Kelly has spent thirty years building service departments from nothing, then giving away everything he knows.
She wanted to write as a child. Instead, Yara Almouti writes validation protocols — building the quality systems, and eventually the regional expertise, that make manufacturers need her less.
An Indian family firm doesn’t see a stake as a percentage — it sees a leash. Aamer Khan pitched 200 promoters, got rejected by 180, and is still building the case that investor money can uncage ambition instead of taking control.
Egypt has 183 pharmaceutical factories and still can’t source enough of its own raw materials. Pharmaconex 2026 brings 360 exhibitors from Egypt, India, and China together to work through what local capability actually costs.
Divya Ramesh and Chuck Gopalakrishnan run Rough Paper as a studio of exactly two, and they intend to keep it that way. They turn down work that would force them to grow, holding to depth over scale and to the quiet worth of a good ordinary Tuesday.
Mocked for his English as a boy, Bhinoy built a company around the wound. Through Teresa’s Learning Centre he teaches people who freeze in interviews and boardrooms that fear, rather than grammar, is the thing holding them back, and that being seen matters more than being big.
Pai is a visual storyteller who works in whatever medium the story needs, from film and illustration to motion graphics. They make deeply personal work about neurodivergence and mental health, and want to use their craft to carry the people whose work matters but who have no appetite for being seen.
