The Donor, Dr. Rajeev Gautam (BT/CHE/1974), was President & CEO of Honeywell Performance Materials and Technologies (PMT) until his retirement in late 2021 after 43 years with the company. Honeywell PMT is a global leader in providing advanced materials, process technologies and automation solutions, with sales of $10 billion in 2021. Dr. Rajeev also served as President of Honeywell UOP, one of the leading suppliers of process technologies that have formed the foundation for most of the world's refiners, efficiently producing gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, petrochemicals and renewable fuels. He also served as Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of PMT. Prior to that he held key positions within UOP, spanning research and development, engineering, and marketing, including Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of UOP. Rajeev began his career with Union Carbide in 1978 and became part of UOP through a joint venture in 1988. Throughout his career, he has championed innovative solutions for industry needs and has been responsible for the development and commercialization of a broad range of catalytic and separations applications for the refining, petrochemical and gas processing industries. Dr. Gautam holds his PhD degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania and MBA from the University of Chicago. He is also a recipient of the prestigious Distinguished Alumnus Award (DAA).
Dr. Dipin S Pillai is an Assistant Professor, Department of Chemical Engineering, IIT Kanpur. His areas of interest are Stability Theory, Reduced-Order Modeling, Transport Phenomena, Electrohydrodynamics and Active Droplets. During his tenure as an Assistant Professor at IIT Kanpur, his research group focused on developing reduced-order models for wetting alteration using electric fields, formation of self-assembled nanoporous anodic oxides, active microdroplets exhibiting self-propulsion, and stability of thin polymer and microbial films. He completed his B.E. (Hons.) from BITS Pilani KK Birla Goa Campus in 2010 and his PhD from IIT Madras in 2016. He was honored with the Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE) Young Associate 2024, Institute Best Research Award for excellence in research during Ph.D., IIT Madras, 2015 and Dhirubhai Ambani foundation Undergraduate Fellowship for academic excellence, 2006.
