Vivas Kumar, a Rice alumnus and CEO/co-founder of Mitra Chem, a lithium-ion battery materials manufacturer, was honored with the Builders Award during the university president’s Town Hall.
The award was established by the Association of Rice Alumni in 2005 to honor “recent alumni who have made outstanding contributions to Rice since graduation.” Vivas co-founded Mitra Chem in 2021, focusing on shortening the lab-to-production timeline for lithium-ion batteries.
He received the award during Rice president Reginald DesRoches’ Town Hall, which took place during Rice Alumni Weekend on Nov. 1 in the Shell Auditorium in McNair Hall.
Kumar earned his B.S. in electrical and computer engineering from Rice in 2014 and went on to earn his MBA from Stanford. He was previously at Tesla as a senior manager responsible for the global battery supply chain, and a principal at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, a London-based specialist information provider for the lithium-ion battery to the electric vehicle supply chain.
At Rice, he served for three years on the Association of Rice Alumni Board of Directors and for more than five years on the Rice Engineering Alumni Board, where he chaired several committees. Kumar has also remained involved with the Rice chapter of Engineers Without Borders for more than 10 years, and continues to mentor young Rice alumni, especially engineers.