Michael Abbene recently retired as Vice President and Chief Information Officer at Arch Coal, Inc., the second largest U.S. coal producer, with responsibility for all information technology. While he was at Arch Coal, the organization was recognized by CIO Magazine, Information Week, and Business Week for its information technology initiatives. Computerworld just honored Mr. Abbene as one of Computerworld’s Premier 100 IT Leaders for 2010. After graduating from Northwestern University with an Industrial Engineering degree, he began his career with GTE (now Verizon) in Chicago and then moved to St. Louis to join Monsanto Company where he held various positions within IT over the course of almost 20 years at Monsanto and affiliated companies. Subsequently, Mr. Abbene worked as a consultant leading major US domestic and international projects for various Fortune 250 clients. He joined Arch Coal in March 2000 as Director Application Services and was appointed VP and CIO in June 2005. Mr. Abbene also has an MBA from Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville and is on the Board of Directors of the Saint Louis Zoo Association.