Curtis R. Priem ’82

2016 Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award Recipient

Through his longstanding service to Rensselaer on the Board of Trustees, and his extraordinary philanthropy, personally and through the Priem Family Foundation, Curtis R. Priem ’82 has forever impacted not only the Rensselaer experience for our faculty and students, but also the literal landscape of the campus.

In recognition of his historic $40 million unrestricted gift, Rensselaer named the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) in his honor. EMPAC is a key platform for the Rensselaer campus, its academic partners, and visiting artists from around the globe to experiment in fields such as investigation of fluid dynamics, artificial intelligence, molecular design, financial modeling, nanotechnology, and gaming and simulation.

In addition to this transformative gift, Mr. Priem has demonstrated his deep respect for Rensselaer’s research with funds to support our faculty, and cast his ultimate vote of confidence in the mission of Rensselaer through his unrestricted giving.

We are pleased to celebrate Mr. Priem’s decision to help us “Bridge the Gap” by providing much-needed undergraduate scholarship support.

Mr. Priem is an inventor who has authored almost 200 U.S. and international patents, all of which relate to graphics and I/O. He designed the first graphics processor for the PC, the IBM Professional Graphics Adapter. Priem co-founded NVIDIA, Corp., a manufacturer of graphics and multimedia integrated circuits in 1993, and served as the chief technical officer from 1993 to 2003. Mr. Priem is also President of the Priem Family Foundation, which he established in 1999.

Mr. Priem holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Rensselaer. Rensselaer honored Mr. Priem with the Rensselaer Alumni Association’s Albert Fox Demers Award in 2005 and the William F. Glaser ʼ53 Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2000.