Sumeet Kapoor ’02 and his beautiful bride Nidhi

Gabriele Saure relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area from Chicago. She is a senior brand manager with the Ghirardelli Chocolate Company.

Manuel O. Mendez joined OraSure Technologies, the market leader in oral fluid diagnostics, in May as vice president of marketing and was promoted to vice president of marketing and sales in November.

Sumeet Kapoor got married earlier this year in India to his beautiful bride Nidhi. Arek Jaszcz and his family made the trek from Switzerland to attend the ceremony and reports a good time was had by all. Sumeet continues as engagement manager for Diamond Management & Technology Consultants.

Brian Contat continues his work with the Eaton Corporation Vehicle Group. He will be moving to Marshall, Mich., in March for an expanded role that encompasses engineering management as well as product strategy (manager, OEM Engineering & Product Strategy).

Melissa Schudt gave birth to John Paul Schudt in May 27. John joins sisters Sarah, Grace and Elizabeth.

Mina Dhaliwal O’Hearn joined Commonwealth Annuity, a Goldman Sachs company, as vice president of planning and analysis. Mina and husband Jim have two daughters, Alison (2.5) and Caitlin (15 months). They reside in Southborough, Mass.

After four years of running Latin American operations, Tarcisio Ribeiro is vice president and general manager for Europe, Middle East and Africa. He and wife Katya relocated to London.

Jose Esteban reports: "I started DiiT Chile in the year 2000 with my brothers. DiiT Chile is an engineering solutions provider for telecommunications, fire and security, mining and defense. We just launched our latest product, CA1600, which is a time-and-attendance system integrated with Honeywells’s Pro-Watch and WinPack access control." Best of luck to you and your firm, Jose.

Demos Tantalidis continues in his role as senior enterprise architect for IBM Global Business Services Public Sector in Charlotte, N.C. He is working on healthcare and federal projects and does not miss the Chicago snow.

Heather Foote Daas, husband Charlie and son Griffin welcomed Spencer Albert Daas on Dec.14. Heather will be returning from maternity leave to her job as manager of business development and planning at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in the spring.

Jon Phillips, wife Ellen and son Henry are enjoying life in Frankfort, Ill., where Jon serves as SVP for commercial banking at Bank of America.

Mitch McCloskey has been busy in Denver as enterprise account executive for Vertafore and as a father of four. Son Cooper James was born in 2009.

Jaideep Vivekanand reports: "Anu, Lepakshi, and I have had a new addition to our family, Kaveri (5), who we adopted last summer. On the work front, Green Evolution, an architectural services firm specializing in green design and green building certification that I started with my architect wife, Anu, completed its first year. We have several green design and certification projects on our plate and are looking to grow this year. The past year has been eventful on the music front as well, with almost monthly gigs with my band ’7even.’ We would love to hear from any Kellogg alumni visiting India, especially Chennai."

David Coleman continues in his role as a credit officer for PNC Bank in Chicago.

Nicole (Smith) Merriam moved to Houston from San Jose, Calif., in December. Nicole says: "My husband got a job offer he couldn’t turn down and my boss agreed to let me work remotely. I am still CFO of McLarney Construction in San Jose. It will give me more time to spend with my two sons (4, 5)."

 Venkat Mullur is senior director of financial industry solutions for TIBCO Spotfire Inc. in Cincinnati. On the news front, Venkat reports that last summer, she and her daughter visited China: "My 10-year-old loved the Great Wall and enjoyed the pandas at Beijing Zoo!"

Angela John makes her home in Houston, where she is vice president for NGL supply at BP.

Jennes Zhang is based in Shenzhen, China, as deputy general manager and vice president of sales in Shenzhen Mele Digital Technology Ltd. Shenzhen Mele is a top R&D firm, a leading manufacturer and exporter for full HD media players and recorders and Internet movie boxes. Jennes travels to Europe, the Americas, Asia and Africa regularly to meet customers worldwide and loves catching up with Kellogg friends in Shenzhen, China, and elsewhere.

Elgin Thompson is diligently training for the running season and 2010 NYC Marathon in spite of his demanding schedule as chief of head of mergers and acquisitions for Williams Capital Group in New York.

Nicki Hines, partner at GCD Consultants in Chicago, is working with designer Tory Burch on her exciting retail real estate expansion in the U.S. and Canada.

 Joseph Medel is global marketing director for OraSure Technologies in Highland Park, Ill.

One very sad note, Michael McLean had to retire due to the return of his colon cancer. Prognosis is uncertain but he and the family will be visiting France and the British Isles this summer. Michael, please know that you are in all our thoughts and prayers.