INTEREST CATEGORY: MARKETING STRATEGY
POSTING TYPE: Awards

Author: Thomas Dotzel

The AMA Marketing Strategy SIG is delighted to announce that Prof. Nirmalya Kumar is the winner of the 2021 Mahajan Award for Lifetime Contributions to Marketing Strategy Research. The three-member selection committee consisting of Bob Meyer, Vikas Mittal, and Harald Van Heerde found Prof. Kumar’s accomplishments and contributions to theory and practice of marketing to be highly remarkable and deserving of this year’s award.

A 1991 Ph.D. from Northwestern University, Professor Kumar is the Lee Kong Chian Professor of Marketing at the Lee Kong Chian School of Business, Singapore Management University (SMU) and a Distinguished Fellow at the INSEAD Emerging Markets Institute. Previously he was heading strategy at the 100 billion dollar Tata Group reporting to the Chairman. He also spent several years at the London Business School and IMD.

Prof. Kumar is one of the most recognized marketing scholars in the world when it comes to impact. In addition to producing some of the most influential academic research on the topic of interfirm relationships, he has written multiple books on leadership, branding, private label strategy, and global marketing.  He continues to impact managerial decision making through his publications in premier outlests such as HBR and his active dialogue with C-level executives at some of the world’s top organizations through his consulting.

Congratulations to Nirmalya Kumar.

Previous winners of the award include David Aaker, George Day, David Montgomery, Rajan Varadarajan, Rajendra Srivastava, Frederick Webster, Gerry Tellis, V. Kumar, Christine Moorman, Ajay Kohli, Roland T. Rust, Stanley F. Slater, Venkatesh Shankar, Dominique Hanssens, Leigh McAlister, Bernie Jaworski, Rajdeep Grewal, Marnik Dekimpe, Rajesh Chandy, Robert W. Palmatier, and Vikas Mittal.