Originally from Mumbai, India, Rahul Mehta is the Founder and Chairman of the Board of the Bhupat & Jyoti Mehta Family Foundation. He established the Foundation in 1996 after successfully exiting his first startup and has since dedicated himself to advancing higher education and building research ecosystems around the world.

Rahul's entrepreneurial journey began at the University of Houston, where a class project sparked his first venture. At 23, with just ten dollars to his name, he launched a company that solved critical challenges for multinational corporations. He went on to build and sell four companies, all self-funded, to Platinum Technology, HP, Veritas, and Brocade, before stepping away from the for-profit world in 2006 to focus entirely on philanthropy.

Under Rahul's leadership, the Mehta Family Foundation is guided by the belief that investment in science drives economic prosperity. This vision has led to the establishment of eight schools across six prestigious Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) in India, spanning bioscience and bioengineering, data science and artificial intelligence, and sustainability. Together, these programs have created a capacity for more than 3,000 students across 620,000 square feet of infrastructure. The Foundation has also funded more than 100 nonprofits/NGOs, created the Mehta Rice Engineering Scholarship program with Rice University, and supported numerous initiatives at the University of Houston.

Rahul has served on the boards of several Houston-area nonprofits, including DePelchin Children's Center, Ronald McDonald House, Bo's Place, American Leadership Forum, Krist Samaritan Center, and Houston Methodist Hospital. A lifelong learner, he is a 2021 Stanford Distinguished Careers Institute Fellow and a 2024 Oxford Next Horizons Scholar. He has completed executive education programs at Stanford, Wharton, Harvard, the University of Chicago, and Rice. An avid traveler who has explored every continent, Rahul remains devoted to the development of humanity and endeavors that his lifelong commitment will leave a meaningful legacy in the lives of others.