People 1-20-03

Steven Gord joined American Capital Strategiesí Philadelphia office as an associate.?Gord was placed at ACAS by Glocap Search LLC of New York and most recently worked at Robertson Stephens as a senior associate.Horng Jye Oh has been hired as an associate at Crosslink Capital.?Oh, placed at Crosslink by Glocap Search of New York, has two engineering degrees from Stanford University.Biren Bhandari joined Riverside Companyís San Francisco office as an associate.?Bhandari was placed there by Glocap Search LLC of New York and was previously at Thomas Weisel Partners.David Thompson has joined GSC Partner as an associate.?Thompson was placed at GSC by Glocap Search. Most recently he was with Goldman Sachsí leveraged finance group.Peter Bianco has been named a senior partner at Milestone Equity Partners Northern Virginia LLC. He recently served as founder and chief executive of BioNetrix.Robert Aguallo Jr., assistant executive officer for investment operations at the California Public Employeesí Retirement System (CalPERS), will leave the pension fund January 31 to become the executive director of the Los Angeles City Employeesí Retirement System (LACERS). Aguallo, a 14-year veteran of CalPERS, will oversee the $6.7 billion City of Los Angeles public employee retirement fund.Chris Pike has been promoted to partner with Advent International. Pike, a buyout pro working in Adventís Boston office, joined the firm in 1997. Pascal Stefani has also been promoted to partner. Stefani, based in Paris, focuses on investments in France as part of the European private equity team.

Yann Duchesne has been hired as a senior principal and managing director by Doughty Hanson in its new Paris office. Duchesne has been with McKinsey & Co. for the past 20 years. Marc Bonavitacola, former chief investment officer for the City of Philadelphia Public Employeesí Retirement System, has been hired by Schroder Ventures International. He will be based in Boston and work on the firmís fund-of-funds effort.

Aris Melissartos has been named secretary of business and economic development of Maryland by Maryland Governor-elect Robert Ehrlich. Melissatros, a former Westinghouse executive, is currently chairman of Armel Private Equity Investments, which invests in technology and bioscience companies.

Lee Tesconi and Charlie Grant are joining Lexington Partners and will be opening a new Boston office for the firm. Tesconi and Grant recently left BancBoston Capital where they were responsible for over $1 billion in secondary transactions during the last 10 years. BancBoston Capital has decided to exit the secondary business as part of their announced private equity downsizing. Tesconi and Grant were also responsible for a number of successful co-investments, including JetBlue Airways and Tweeter, as well as making investments in new primary funds.

Carl Rosendhal has left his post as a general partner with Mobius Venture Partners. Gary Rieschel, executive managing director with Mobius, says he left to ìspend more time with his family.î

Steven Garber has been named senior vice president in Houlihan Lokey Howard & Zukinís Financial Advisory Group. Based in the firmís San Francisco office, Garberís primary responsibilities include managing client projects, rendering financial opinions, valuing business entities, designing and valuing equity and debt securities and developing new business. Prior to joining Houlihan Lokey, Garber was with Willamette Management Associates for over 12 years.

John Burns, Christopher Markgraf and Edward Meissner have all been promoted to vice president at Summit Partners.

Burns was promoted from senior associate to vice president. He has been with Summit since 1999 and focuses his efforts on middle market buyouts, recapitalizations and growth equity investments in healthcare, manufacturing, distribution, consumer products, and business services. Markgraf was promoted from senior associate to vice president. He joined Summit Partners in 1998 and also focuses his efforts on buyouts, recapitalizations and growth equity investments in middle market companies in healthcare, manufacturing, distribution, consumer products and business services. Meissner was promoted from corporate controller to vice president and corporate controller. Meissner joined Summit in 2000 and oversees the accounting functions including bank financing, international operations, corporate accounting and tax.

Lou Volpe has been hired as co-managing general partner at Kodiak Venture Partners, a seed- and early-stage venture firm focused on communications/IT, semiconductor and software companies. In his new position, Volpe will join Dave Furneaux, Kodiakís co-founder and current managing general partner, to share firm leadership.

Robert Wolfe has joined Northwest Venture Associates as a general partner in its Seattle office. Prior to joining NWVA as a general partner, Bob was an entrepreneur in residence and advisory board member with the firm.