Eric C. Johnson

Eric Johnson is vice president for resource development at Rice University in Houston, Texas.  He oversees relations with Rice’s alumni and marshals the university’s resources to develop gifts and grants from alumni, corporations, foundations and other university friends and supporters.

Before coming to Rice in 1999, Johnson was the vice president for development at Carnegie Mellon University for seven years.  He had overall responsibility for Carnegie Mellon’s fund raising and alumni relations.  During his seven years at Carnegie Mellon, he planned and implemented a successful, comprehensive $350 million campaign, and led the university’s first efforts at fund raising in Hong Kong, Korea and Singapore. Johnson worked twenty years at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.), including four years as director of corporate relations where he had responsibility for the Industrial Liaison Program and all corporate gifts.

He has extensive experience in university-industry relations in the United States, Europe and Asia.  As assistant dean of engineering at M.I.T., he played a key role in the development of a large university-industry partnership called Leaders for Manufacturing. In 1992, he was a member of the U.S.-Japan Technology Transfer Joint Study Panel established by MITI and the U.S. Department of Commerce.

In 1981-82, Johnson took a leave from his university career to return to industry.  He worked for two years as marketing manager with Zanussi S.p.A. in Italy.  Earlier in his career, he worked five years as an engineer with Kennecott Copper Corporation.  Johnson was a member of the board of directors of the Englehart Company in Davenport, Iowa, from 1987-1996 and is currently the chairman of the board of Rice Trust Inc.

Johnson grew up in Fargo, North Dakota.  He earned his bachelor’s degree in metallurgy at M.I.T. and his master’s degree in operations research at Case Western Reserve University.

Vice President for Resource Development
Rice University
Resource Development-MS 82
P.O. Box 1892
Houston, Texas 77251-1892

Allen Center, Third Floor
6100 Main Street
Houston, Texas 77005-1892

Phone: 713-348-6090
Fax: 713-348-5187
E-mail: ericj@rice.edu