Bright Simons world’s 47th greatest leader

Bright Simons, 34, is the 47th greatest leader in the world out of a list of 50 compiled by Fortune Magazine.

The founder of mPedigree counterfeit drug detection firm is ranked among leaders like Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos – No.1; German Chancellor Angela Merkel – No.2; Nobel Peace Prize laureate and Burmese politicians Aung San Suu Kyi – No.3, and Pope Francis – No.4.

A citation in Fortune read: “Counterfeit drugs are rife in Africa – one estimate pegs the chances of purchasing one at 30%, and in 2013 more than 120,000 African children died because of poor-quality anti-malarials. Simons, a 34-year-old entrepreneur from Ghana, offered a boldly simple solution: Africans could check the authenticity of medications by sending mPedigree a text message with the special 12-digit code marked on their drug packet. Now mPedigree has its labels on more than 500 million packets, with clients including giants AstraZeneca and Sanofi. The company is currently active in 12 countries in the developing world.”

Others who made the list include Apple chief Tim Cook, Stephen Curry, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, John Oliver, and Paul Ryan.