This NJIT Alum Helps Define What Luxury Looks Like at Estée Lauder

If you’ve ever picked up a Tom Ford fragrance or reached for an Aveda haircare product, you’ve already encountered Laszlo Moharita’s work — whether you realized it or not.

As vice president of Package Development for Fragrance and Haircare at The Estée Lauder Companies, Moharita leads global teams of engineers, designers, and material scientists responsible for bringing some of the world’s most iconic beauty brands to life. Every detail — from the weight of a bottle to the feel of a cap — is deliberate. It’s where precision meets perception, and where Moharita has built his career.

That career traces back, unexpectedly, to Newark.

Moharita arrived in the United States from Venezuela in 1997 without fluency in English. Within a year, he was sitting in his first class at NJIT. Three years later, he graduated with a B.S. in Industrial Engineering, a perfect 4.0 GPA, and valedictorian honors. The speed of that ascent is striking, but more revealing is how it happened: he met pressure head-on and got to work.

“NJIT gave me the mindset that no problem is ever too challenging,” Moharita said. “It just takes the right group of people coming together and bringing their expertise to solve it.”

He put that mindset into motion immediately. A final internship turned into a full-time role at Estée Lauder’s fragrance manufacturing facility — and within a year, he was selected for the company’s prestigious Presidential Management Development Program, a fast track for high-potential leaders.

After several years rotating across Estée Lauder’s brands, Moharita moved to Johnson & Johnson, where he spent 16 years expanding his leadership across packaging, engineering, and R&D in beauty, healthcare, and e-commerce. He ultimately led OTC package development before returning to Estée Lauder, where he now oversees global package development for fragrance and haircare.

At NJIT, two professors helped shape how he thinks: Athanassios Bladikas and Layek Abdel-Malek. They challenged students to push past easy answers — and rewarded curiosity. It’s a mindset Moharita carried forward.

Never stop learning.

Ask him about his proudest accomplishment, and he doesn’t point to a product, an award or a title.

“The biggest accomplishment in my career has been the teams of people I have been able to assemble and lead,” he said. “I love working with and developing people and seeing them achieve their greatest potential.”

That focus on growth extends to himself. Since graduating, Moharita has earned an MBA in marketing along with multiple advanced certificates in product design, innovation, entrepreneurship, and R&D management — a reflection of his belief that learning is never finished.

His advice to students is direct: don’t treat education as a phase.

“Never stop learning. School does not stop when you finish your bachelor’s. Keep your eyes open to see what the industry needs — and once you've identified the skills you want to develop, go back to school to accelerate the process.”

For those looking for a more immediate edge, he adds: pursue internships with intention — they matter more than you think — and seek out environments that challenge you.

Outside the office, there’s another layer to his story: Moharita once played for the Venezuelan U16 National Basketball Team — a detail that surprises people who know him only through his corporate career. Basketball is very much his passion and he still plays it at least twice a week.

After years of building a corporate career, he’s now looking back toward where it began.

“Now that I have enough experience, I would love to connect more with students, share my journey and be a vehicle to their learning.”