Published on, Aug. 28 -- August 28, 2025 1:06 AM

It's the late 90s and the tech boom is in full swing. Walking the streets of downtown San Francisco, the buzz is palpable, with dot.com advertisements everywhere; one particular set of ads cuts through the clutter. These depict smiling people with picture-perfect white teeth, holding up what appear to be plastic dental retainers. Upon a closer look: meet Invisalign, the world's very first invisible plastic dental braces - now popularly known as 'aligners.'

This was the world's very first introduction to Pakistani-American Zia Chishti - co-founder of Align Technology, the company behind the iconic clear dental aligners. After leaving Align, Chishti set up The Resource Group (TRG) with a co...