Just weeks af­ter he stepped down as chair­man, Emer­gen­t's for­mer CEO dies at age 64

In the 20-plus years of his com­pa­ny’s ex­is­tence, Fuad El-Hi­b­ri built up a man­u­fac­tur­ing con­stant that gained the trust of the US gov­ern­ment with just a sin­gle prod­uct.

El-Hi­b­ri died on April 23 at the age of 64, just weeks af­ter step­ping down as the chair­man of Emer­gent’s board. A fam­i­ly rep­re­sen­ta­tive told the New York Times that El-Hi­b­ri died af­ter a bat­tle with pan­cre­at­ic can­cer.

El-Hi­b­ri was born in Hildesheim, Ger­many, grew up in both Lebanon and Ger­many, and grad­u­at­ed from Stan­ford Uni­ver­si­ty in 1980 with an eco­nom­ics de­gree. Af­ter get­ting an­oth­er de­gree from Yale, he start­ed work­ing in the telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions in­dus­try. Af­ter he start­ed Emer­gent — then called Bio­Port — in 1998, the com­pa­ny turned a prof­it with­in just four years of ex­is­tence, in­clud­ing through the Great Re­ces­sion.

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