D.Sivakumar receives 2026 Dean’s Award for Achievement

By Elizabeth Egan

The Dean’s Award for Achievement is the highest honor presented by the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), awarded annually to an individual who has distinguished themselves through an exceptional professional career.

Sivakumar was drawn to UB by the school’s strong computer science program. His decision to attend was finalized after being offered the UB President’s Fellowship.

“UB has been absolutely the most important phase of my life that defined who I became and what I have been able to do since then,” said Sivakumar.

During his first semester in 1991, Sivakumar recalled being particularly inspired by his first computing class, taught by Kenneth Regan, professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, who would go on to become his advisor.

“The class was so much fun and my first real introduction to theory of computing,” said Sivakumar. “I absolutely fell in love with that subject, and it remains one of my high points from UB.”

After completing his PhD, Sivakumar went on to pursue different careers, spanning roles as a professor, researcher, engineer and entrepreneur.

He initially envisioned himself remaining in academia as a professor and went to the University of Houston, where he served as a faculty member. From there, he moved on to positions at IBM and Google.

“Each role has been a fabulous journey in its own right,” said Sivakumar, who noted that all of his roles had different elements that piqued his interest.

As a member of the computer science faculty at the University of Houston, he loved being able to teach about his favorite subjects and bring clarity to his students regarding the field they were studying.

Sivakumar described his next position as a research staff member at IBM as the most intellectually exciting period of his career as he worked with powerhouses in the theory of computing. At Google, his work as a staff research assistant and then director of research and artificial intelligence touched billions of people.

Today, Sivakumar is the co-founder of Tonita, a conversational shopping search engine. Sivakumar co-founded Tonita with his wife Uma Mahadevan, who earned her PhD in computer science at UB in 1997.

“My journey into entrepreneurship was motivated by a very specific goal,” said Sivakumar, who noted that he could see the huge potential ahead while working at Google during the early days of AI. “I felt that one place AI did not have a lot of impact was shopping and commerce.”

Sivakumar observed that when making almost any purchase online, there are many options and different factors to consider, making the process inefficient and overwhelming. In response, he built an AI-based shopping search engine that makes the search interactive, conversational and more enjoyable.

The foundational computer science knowledge that Sivakumar gained at UB prepared him to pursue these different paths.

“Both in terms of classes I took and people I worked with, there was a strong emphasis on getting the foundations right,” said Sivakumar. “That has given me such a strong platform to do everything that has come later in my work at IBM, Google and even today.”

Sivakumar recalled many fond memories from his time at UB, with a significant one being that he and his wife welcomed their first child just after he finished his PhD. A month before the baby was due, Regan invited the couple over for dinner and threw them a surprise baby shower.

He also remembers Sargur Srihari, a professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering and one of Sivakumar’s many mentors from UB, who passed away in 2022, inviting all of his students over for Thanksgiving.

“These gestures are the kind of memories you don’t forget,” said Sivakumar. “It is the people that make the place. These experiences make you strongly tied to a place and that is why I am so excited about staying connected with UB.”

One way that Sivakumar stays connected to UB is by serving on the Department of Computer Science and Engineering’s advisory board.

In his commencement address, Sivakumar planned to discuss his proudest achievements since graduating from UB and offered a few tips regarding habits that are great to adopt as people navigate the new age of AI.

Ahead of his speech, Sivakumar offered the following advice to the class of 2026: “Continue learning forever, not just because it is the right thing to do or because times are changing, but because a huge part of who we are as humans is that we continue learning forever.”