"Dixit earned his master’s degree in textile technology from the University of Massachusetts in 1966, and soon after joined Garlock, where he was tasked with establishing what, at the time, was the most modern asbestos plant in the world in Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada. Always striving to improve, Dixit went on to earn an MBA from RIT’s Saunders College of Business in 1974. In 1978, he left Garlock, launching his own company, Newtex, where he developed Zetex fiberglass fabric, the industry’s first safe and commercially viable alternative to asbestos. In just five years, Newtex had grown to $2.4 million in sales. In recognition of Dixit’s forward-thinking and entrepreneurial leadership, the company was recognized as one of the Top 10 Small Businesses in the U.S., and in 1991, President George H.W. Bush presented Dixit with the Excellence in Exporting Award. Dixit led Newtex to become the only fully integrated provider of woven materials and fabric-based systems that protect from heat and fire—from proprietary glass yarn processing, in-house-weaving, coating and laminating to custom-designed and custom-sewn systems. Newtex continued to grow, acquiring companies in Singapore and China. “As founder and CEO of Newtex, I encouraged and valued creativity and innovation, along with taking calculated risks,” Dixit said. “I believed in those days that the best way to stay ahead of the competition was to find new and better ways to solve problems.”