Adrian Ballinger is a British-American certified IFMGA/AMGA mountain guide, certified through the American Mountain Guides Association and a sponsored climber and skier. Ballinger is the founder and CEO of Alpenglow Expeditions, and has been guiding full-time for 25 years. He has led over 150 international climbing expeditions on six continents, and made 18 successful summits of 8,000m peaks. He is known for pioneering the use of pre-acclimatization for commercial expeditions as early as 2012, which can cut the amount of time typically spent on an expedition in half. Adrian is the only American to have made three successful ski descents of 8,000m peaks, including the first ski descent of Manaslu from its summit. He is also the fourth American to have summited both Mount Everest and K2 without the use of supplemental oxygen.

Himex is a Mount Everest guiding company. It was founded in 1996 by New Zealander Russell Brice. The name is a truncated version of the full name "Himalayan Experience". National Geographic said Himex was the "largest and most sophisticated guiding operation on Everest" in a 2013 article. Himex's team is known for fixing lines on Mount Everest, although in 2012 other teams did this work.