A true diversifier

Last Sunday, I had the opportunity to attend the St. Martens party (in Portuguese ‘Magusto’) at the Hovione premises in Taipa. For those who do not know Hovione, it is a corporation with a manufacturing plant in Macau and premises in eight other locations, from Lisbon to New Jersey, and in Mainland China, India, Japan, Hong Kong, and Ireland. Driven by the vision of its CEO, Mr. Guy Villax, it has expanded hugely over the last two decades.
It is also the reason why you read this column here in Macau. As a matter of fact, in early 2012 I was placed in Macau by the then ICEP (Portuguese external trade agency) now AICEP.
Truth be told, it is one of the sole examples of diversification of the economy in Macau.
In the land of gaming, it produces pharmaceutical products and focuses on the development and manufacture of challenging products that demand the highest standards of process chemistry and manufacturing expertise coupled with rigorous regulatory compliance. Well, it seems that we’re talking about another championship after this sentence. And we are.
It could be an example for many other companies who consider that in Macau there are no conditions for this type of entrepreneurialism.
Furthermore, in a world changing rapidly into something we cannot still perceive the shape of it was established in Portugal in 1959 by Ivan Villax and two other Hungarian refugees: Nicholas de Horthy and Andrew Onody. Thus its name. Yes, refugees, my dear friends, of the same nature as those who are being called by some politicians to be the source of all harm.
The example of the founders of this multinational corporation could well be studied by some leaders of Europe, the United States and Asia in order to understand that we are all human beings with competences and capabilities of making a better world for our children.
As Pope Francis said last week: those who want to make walls instead of bridges cannot be called Christians. Respect for humanity is at a decisive moment and we must all work for different races, cultures and backgrounds to find common bridges and platforms and bring the others within our circles. Unfortunately, it seems that not all think alike and prefer to divide humans as if they were irrational beings.