Our Diverse Team of Co-Creators

Sanjay Duggal, Founder & CEO

Having done business on Five Continents, Sanjay Duggal, Stellar Eastern’s CEO is acutely aware of how ruefully inadequate methods of the past are becoming today. The change around us is relentless, and an expanded mind with a willingness to perpetually learn and relearn is the only way forward. For everyone.

Sanjay cut his professional teeth with the world’s top hospitality school - Hilton International and honed his skills in a dozen different luxury hotels around the globe. Subsequent involvements include Large-Scale Industrial Catering, Multi-Unit American Casual Dining, Family Entertainment, Premium Confectionery, Retail, Event Management and Franchise Development. During this time, extensive on-site exposure to multiple global franchise systems gave him a solid grounding in franchising.

Sanjay writes extensively on franchising and business in several reputed regional and international publications, and doesn’t shy away from challenging long established convention in his writings. By calling out contentious practices in the global franchising arena, he attracted the attention of the IFA (International Franchise Association) and is now a contributor to their Franchising World publication.

In his role as CEO of Stellar Eastern Franchise & Retail Advisory, Sanjay helps individuals, corporations and private equity firms with the planning and execution of business investment strategies. This includes tactical and strategic consulting on signing franchise agreements and developing independent brands.

In a resounding endorsement of his innovation skills, MGM Resorts, Las Vegas offered a space in their new billion-dollar resort to an original Food & Beverage concept that he conceived and developed.

Sanjay believes that the future belongs to franchised brands that tangibly recognize the confluence of challenges faced by franchisees and promote more equitable business relationsh

Published articles by sanjay

Queenie Mendonca, Director of PR & Communications

Chicago based Queenie Mendonca has had a distinguished career as a Healthcare Management & Administration professional, who spent over two decades in key roles at one of the most reputed hospitals in the United States.

Besides being the Business Manager of the Anesthesiology & Pain Management department, her roles have included managing the hospital’s vast multinational residency program’s communication, scheduling & coordination needs.

She is particularly passionate about alternative therapies and actively supports initiatives in this field. This included representing her organization at overseas conferences on Acupuncture and TCM.

Queenie has been actively involved in community organization at the Lions Club Foundation and has held the presidency of a major Christian association in Chicago. Besides that, she is involved in several social causes and is a trustee of the International Development Foundation that serves educational needs of underprivileged children.

Queenie maintains close relationships with Stellar Eastern clients and associates, and is their go to person whenever they need help or guidance. Public relations is her forte and comes to her naturally. She devotes a considerable amount of her time to enhancing Stellar Eastern's networking in the world of franchising at large, and health and wellness franchises in particular.

Bruce Rosenbaum, Design Specialist & Global "Steampunk" Guru

The Steampunk art and design process celebrates history, while setting a path for a reimagined better future - telling the personal stories of objects, individuals, organizations and places.

Bruce Rosenbaum has been dubbed the Steampunk Guru by the Wall Street Journal and Steampunk Evangelist by Wired Magazine. Bruce's functional Steampunk artwork has been featured in the Boston Globe, The Chicago Tribune, The New York Times, Architectural Digest, CNN, NPR and featured on MTV, A&E, HGTV, TED Talks and Netflix.

Bruce's company, Modvic works with clients all across the world to take period, repurposed, personal and meaningful objects, and creatively infuse them with modern technology to transform the ordinary into incredible. Stellar Eastern and Modvic have worked together on Steampunk themed restaurant design and share a conviction that the extraordinary elements of Steampunk would be highly valued in the Middle East and Asian retail and franchising world.

Collectively, they seek to collaborate with individuals and organizations seeking to create visually appealing, 'hit-making' functional Steampunk art for their hospitality and retail projects - infusing modern technology into period objects, machinery, equipment and architectural salvage from the buildings and local areas where the projects are located. Bruce's iconic, functional and kinetic art sculptures and adaptive reuse design will uniquely tell your project's specific past/present/future story of resilience and re-imagination.

Some of Bruce's Steampunk projects can be viewed at https://modvic.com/portfolio/

Schuyler "Rocky" Reidel, Franchise Attorney

Schuyler “Rocky” Reidel is the founder and managing attorney for Reidel Law Firm (https://www.reidellawfirm.com/). He started the Firm in 2014 with a vision to provide valuable, cost-effective counsel to business owners in Texas. As the Firm has grown, he expanded his practice to bring his personable and accessible brand of counsel to include franchise law and international trade matters. While his firm is based in Galveston, Texas – where he grew up, he is often found around the world traveling for business events and assisting clients.

Schuyler has a major passion for helping businesses thrive and assisting owners to reach their full potential. He built the Firm to embody the very values he finds important in any business relationship: accessibility, efficiency, and dependability. Some of the values he practices everyday are:

• He answers his own phone and emails. How can you get important and timely counsel when you have to go through robot menus or numerous assistants to just chat about what the issues are?

• Every project is flat fee. He believes billing by the hour is neither efficient nor ethical for attorneys. Each project is billed on a flat fee determined by the scope of the project, the complexity of the matter, and the time involved.

• He meets his deadlines and shows up ahead of schedule. A big reason for this is that he provides realistic timelines for his clients or potential clients. He keeps his practice areas limited, so he doesn’t get behind on schedule and can work efficiently for clients.

Schuyler's Bar Admissions and Licenses:

• Texas, 2014

• US District Court – Southern District of Texas, 2015

• US Court of International Trade, 2016

• US Customs Broker, 2016

Associations:

• Chairman, General Practice Committee, Business Law Section of Texas State Bar (2016-Present)

• Secretary/Treasurer, Business Law Section of Texas State Bar (2019-2020)

• Member, Business Law Section of Texas State Bar (2016-Present)

• Member, Forum on Franchising, American Bar Association (2014-Present)

• Member, International Compliance Professionals Association (2021-Present)

• Member, National Defense Industry Association (2021-Present)

• Member, Houston Customs Brokers Association (2021-Present)

Frank Yurasek, Ph.D., Oriental Medicine Specialist & Alternative Therapy Franchise Advisor

Besides being a highly accomplished practitioner of Acupuncture and Traditional Oriental Medicine, Chicago based Frank Yurasek is also an advocate of making the benefit of alternative therapies more accessible to the populace.

He received his MSOM from Midwest College of Oriental Medicine, Chicago, and his TCMD from Guangzhou University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, PRC. He received his initial mentoring from Dr. Yin Lun Han, and Dr. Wang Yang, both 3rd generation practitioners from Shenyang, China. Prof. Yurasek has been in practice and teaching East Asian Medicine since 1988 and co-published the Journal of Oriental Medicine for 20 years.

He has presented papers at the World Federation of Acupuncture Society Meetings in Beijing, Toronto, and Society of Acupuncture Research Meetings at Harvard, University of Michigan, and Stanford Medical Schools. He is the President of Chicago College of Oriental Medicine and specializes in hospital-based acupuncture for the last 16 years. This includes being the Director of Acupuncture for Cook County Health & Hospitals Systems.

Dr. Suneel Sharma, Managing Director, India - Analytics and Emerging Technologies Specialist

Dr. Suneel Sharma is an accomplished academician who did his Graduation from BITS Pilani, Post Graduation in Entrepreneurship from IIM Bangalore, Ph.D. in Computational Finance from University of Rajasthan and Post-Doctoral studies in Certified Academic Practice at Lancaster University, UK.

He started his career in Jindal Iron & Steel and now has multiple ventures in the area of analytics, and emerging technologies. Stellar Eastern clients and partners greatly benefit from his in-depth experience and insights in these two extremely critical areas of business.

Dr. Sharma loves to contribute to academia through teaching and research. He has worked with ICFAI Business School, Lancaster University and SPJIMR, Mumbai. Prior to moving to Bengaluru he was Director, Professional Programme at SP Jain School of Global Management. His research is in the area of Cognitive Automation, Risk and Operation analytics and applications in Banking, Utilities, Logistics, and Government.

He has served society through various rural education initiatives, community development programmes, and students' social projects. He is an empanelled adviser for Government of India and Srilanka in the areas of E-governance policy initiatives. His areas of interest are Data Visualization; Business Intelligence; Digital Design and Innovation, Emerging Technologies like Cloud, IoT, Virtual and Augmented Reality.

He also holds a Pilot’s License and is a Professional Deep Sea Diver.

Avi Chand, Director of Marketing Strategy

Avi Chand is a veteran marketing communications and branding professional with over 20 years of experience in delivering communications campaigns for large international organizations in Asia and North America.

Avi started his career as a counselor and marketer for the University of California at Berkeley and the University of California at Los Angeles. He progressed to execute large-scale pan-Asia communications and branding campaigns for other international organizations such as SAP Education, the National University of Singapore, SugarCRM, and others.

He has designed and executed seamless cross-platform programs across print, broadcast, and interactive media. He has experience in branding, strategic planning, advertising planning, creative development, and campaign management. Currently, he runs a marketing consultancy to offer digital marketing solutions to a wide range of small and medium business clients.

Alongside his marketing practice, Avi also conducts training and education programs. He uses computer simulations to train business students and executives in strategy and marketing. He has conducted training programs at institutions such as Management Development Institute (MDI Gurgaon), the Faculty of Management Studies (FMS, Delhi University), Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies (NMIMS), Mumbai, and others. He has also taught branding and advertising to MBA students at other pre-eminent business schools in India.

Avi has a BA Economics from St. Stephen’s College, India, and an MBA in Marketing from the National University of Singapore and the Richard Ivey Business School, Western University, Canada.