Scott Rechler Named Chair of NYU Tandon School of Engineering Board

NYU Tandon School of Engineering today announced that Scott Rechler, CEO and Chairman of the real estate company RXR - and current NYU Board of Trustees member – joined the NYU Tandon Board as its Chair, effective June 8, 2026.

Rechler, who was recently named to the NYC Business Advisory Council by Mayor Zohran Mamdani, succeeds Chandrika Tandon, who stepped down as chair after more than a decade serving in that role. Tandon remains on the School of Engineering Board, the NYU Board of Trustees and continues as Chair of the NYU President's Global Council and Chair of Tandon Capital Associates.

“On behalf of the entire Tandon community, I want to express my deepest gratitude to Chandrika for her extraordinary leadership for the past eleven years,” said Juan de Pablo, NYU’s Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Executive Vice President for Global Science & Technology and Executive Dean of NYU Tandon. “Her vision and generosity have left a lasting mark on this School. I'm thrilled that Scott Rechler is now picking up the mantle. Scott brings a rare combination of civic leadership, entrepreneurial drive, and deep ties to New York's innovation economy, and I know he will help lead Tandon with the same ambition that has defined his career.”

Rechler is collaborating closely with de Pablo and the rest of the Board to ensure NYU Tandon is well-positioned for its new chapter, which centers AI across its curriculum, advances Tandon’s leadership in fields including quantum technologies, robotics, communications, chip design, advanced computing, materials, sustainability, and biomedical technologies, and enables world-class research that bridges multiple disciplines both within Tandon and across NYU broadly.

Together they are focused on ensuring Tandon delivers on its ambitious growth goals, fueled by a $1 billion investment NYU made to Tandon in 2022 to revamp and expand the School’s facilities and dramatically deepen its faculty bench.

“Chandrika has provided extraordinary leadership to Tandon, and I am honored to build on the foundation she created,” said Rechler. “We are entering an era of unprecedented technological change, creating an enormous opportunity for Tandon and NYU. Tandon can be a place where breakthrough technologies are not only discovered, but brought to life — combining world-class engineering and research with the deep domain expertise across NYU to turn innovation into real-world solutions. Juan has an ambitious vision for the School, and tremendous momentum is already building. I am excited to work with him, the Board and the broader NYU community to position Tandon at the forefront of this next era of innovation.”

In addition to Rechler, eight more new members joined the Board this year, each an accomplished leader in their field. Six of them — Amy P. Batallones, Marianna Bonanome, Kevin Chan, Pradeep Fernandes, Courtney Flood, and Len Shustek — are Tandon alumni. Manish Ghayalod brings a career in financial technology leadership. Marc H. Bell, a current NYU Trustee, also joins the Board. The incoming class's careers span private equity, asset management, cybersecurity, quantum technology, aerospace, real estate, and finance.

About Scott Rechler

Scott Rechler is CEO and Chairman of RXR, a fully integrated real estate company and investment manager that owns and manages more than 30 million square feet of commercial property and over 9,600 multifamily units. Under his leadership, RXR has led major public-private developments including the $4 billion redevelopment of Terminal 6 at JFK International Airport and a 1,100-acre, $3 billion mixed-use project in Raleigh, North Carolina, and has expanded into fast-growing markets such as Phoenix, Denver, Dallas, and Tampa.

Before founding RXR in 2007, Rechler was Chair and CEO of Reckson Associates Realty Corp. (NYSE: RA), which he took public in 1995 and later sold to SL Green (NYSE: SLG) for more than $6 billion.

Rechler is currently in his second three-year term on the Board of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, where he serves on the Audit and Risk Committee. He previously served as Vice Chairman of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (2011–2016), where he chaired the committee overseeing capital planning and helped lead the redevelopment of LaGuardia Airport, the Goethals Bridge replacement, and the World Trade Center complex. He also served on the Board of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (2017–2019) and chaired the Regional Plan Association (2017–2023).

Rechler is a NYU trustee and Vice Chair of the National September 11th Memorial and Museum. He chairs the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research and serves on the board of Northwell Health, in addition to the Real Estate Roundtable and the Real Estate Board of New York. He is a graduate of Clark University and the NYU Schack Institute in the School of Professional Studies.

New Board Members:

Amy P. Batallones, Managing Director, Blackstone, where she leads global cybersecurity operations for the Technology and Innovations group. She previously worked in cybersecurity at Con Edison and serves as President of the NYU Polytechnic Alumni Association Board. She holds an M.S. in Management of Technology from NYU Tandon and a B.S. in Computer Science from Fordham University.

Marc H. Bell, Managing Partner, Marc Bell Capital Partners, a multi-disciplined family office. He is co-founder of Armor Residential REIT and Magnet Defense, a manufacturer of fully autonomous ships, and is a three-time Tony Award-winning Broadway producer for Jersey Boys, August: Osage County, and Stereophonic. He serves on the NYU Board of Trustees and previously served on the NYU Langone Health Board of Trustees. He earned his master's degree from the NYU School of Professional Studies.  

Marianna Bonanome, CEO, Dainamiq, a tech company working at the intersection of quantum technologies and AI. She co-founded and leads Dainamiq and serves as Senior Director of Partnerships at Qunnect. She holds a B.S. in Mathematics from NYU Tandon and a master's and doctorate in Mathematics from the CUNY Graduate Center.

Kevin Chan, Managing Partner, SEAVI Advent Private Equity, a Southeast Asia-focused private equity firm. He has more than two decades of experience in private equity and investment banking across Asia and the U.S., including senior roles at HSBC Investment Bank Asia and Goldman Sachs Asia. He holds an MBA from Columbia Business School and an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from NYU Tandon.

Pradeep Fernandes, strategist and supply chain executive who most recently served as Vice President of Supply Chain at Boeing, where he managed approximately $5 billion in procurement across its commercial airplane programs. Previously, he led corporate strategy for Boeing Commercial Airplanes and was a founding member of Boeing HorizonX. He holds a B.S. in Aerospace Engineering from Polytechnic University (now NYU Tandon), a Master's in Aerospace, Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from MIT, and an MBA in Strategy from The Wharton School.

Courtney Flood, Principal and Founder, Fulhame, a strategic advisory firm serving the chemical and ingredients industry. She previously held business development and commercial roles at LBB Specialties, Croda, and Brenntag, and was named to American Institute of Chemical Engineers’ (AIChE) 35 Under 35. She earned her B.S. in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering from NYU Tandon.

Manish Ghayalod, Global Chief Technology Officer and Group Managing Director, TCW, where he leads the enterprise technology organization and strategy. He previously held senior technology leadership roles at Charles Schwab Asset Management Solutions and J.P. Morgan Asset Management, and earlier spent six years at Goldman Sachs. He is a Chartered Financial Analyst and earned his B.S in Computer Engineering from the University of Mumbai and his M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Florida.

Len Shustek, Co-Founder and Chairman Emeritus, Computer History Museum. He co-founded Nestar Systems (1979) and Network General (1986), and taught computer science at Carnegie Mellon and Stanford. He holds a B.S. and M.S. in Physics from Polytechnic Institute (now NYU Tandon) and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford, and served as a Polytechnic trustee from 1998 to 2008.

The Board’s current roster also includes Steven M. Cohen, Anthony Concolino, Charles Hinkaty, Tal Kerret, Mark Leslie, Stan Polovets, Dasha Ray Rettew, Ravinder Sajwan, Joseph S. Steinberg, Ranjan Tandon, Daniel Tisch and Phil Venables.

Stacie Grossman Bloom, John Frankel, James Hahn, Robert V. Jones, Alexander Lurye, and Ramesh Srinivasan completed their service on the Tandon Board this past year.