Media365
Revathi Advaithi, the Indian-American chief executive of Fortune 500 company Flex, has joined hands with her husband, Jeevan Mulgund, to create a permanent $1 million scholarship endowment at BITS Pilani for economically disadvantaged women students.
The announcement came during BITS Pilani’s Convocation 2026, where Advaithi, a 1986 mechanical engineering graduate of the institute, returned to campus as the chief guest.
The scholarship is aimed at ensuring that financial hardship does not stand in the way of women pursuing higher education, especially in STEM disciplines.
For BITS Pilani, the gesture is also a powerful homecoming from an alumna who went on to lead one of the world’s biggest electronics manufacturing and supply chain companies.
BITS Pilani hailed Advaithi as a leader who has helped shape the future of advanced manufacturing.
“Advaithi exemplifies the excellence, innovation, and impact that define the BITSian spirit. Her remarkable path from our classrooms to leading a Fortune 500 company inspires generations of students and alumni alike,” the institute said.
Speaking to the graduating class, Advaithi reflected on her own journey from Pilani to the global corporate stage.
She urged students to build strong support systems, trust their abilities and stay disciplined in the pursuit of their goals.
Advaithi is currently the CEO of Flex, formerly Flextronics, a global electronics manufacturing and supply chain services company.
Before taking over at Flex, she served as president and chief operating officer of Eaton’s Electrical Sector. Earlier in her career, she spent six years at Honeywell, where she held leadership roles across manufacturing, procurement, supply chain and sourcing.
She has also emerged as a strong voice for public-private collaboration in manufacturing and supply chains.
In 2023, Advaithi was appointed by the US President to the Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations and the Advisory Committee on Supply Chain Competitiveness.
She also serves on the board of Uber and on the MIT Presidential CEO Advisory Board.
‘Her words clearly struck a deep chord’
Prof. V. Ramgopal Rao, group vice chancellor of BITS Pilani, thanked Advaithi and her family for the scholarship endowment.
He said her convocation address was one of the most memorable he had heard.
“It is rare to see students rise in a standing ovation after a convocation address. Her words clearly struck a deep chord with them,” he said.
The endowment is designed to provide long-term support to women students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds, helping them continue their education without interruption.
BITS Pilani’s Pilani campus conferred degrees on 1,477 graduates at Convocation 2026.
The graduating batch included 1,087 undergraduate students, 271 postgraduate students and 119 Ph.D. scholars.
In his address, Rao also pushed graduates to think beyond using imported technologies and instead focus on building new ones.
“Do not become engineers who only learn to use technologies created elsewhere. Become engineers who build technologies for India and for the world,” he said.
He also pointed to the institute’s recent expansion in academics and research.
BITS Pilani has added six new undergraduate programmes and 269 new faculty members. The institute now has more than 3,000 Ph.D. scholars.
Its annual extramural research funding has crossed Rs 100 crore (around $10.36 million), while around 190 patents were filed in the last financial year.
