The Inaugural AIM-AMA Sheth Foundation Doctoral Consortium in marketing on the theme, “Research in Emerging Markets”, was organized by Alliance University, Bangalore at its Central Campus from July 27-29, 2012. This is the first time that the American Marketing Association and the Sheth Foundation have held this prestigious Consortium outside of North America. The Doctoral Consortium invited the best and brightest doctoral fellows (Ph.D. students) in marketing to interact and be mentored by the most respected and eminent scholars in marketing, globally—many of whom are legendary scholars in marketing. Doctoral degree granting institutions from India as well as countries such as China, Russia, Australia, Turkey, Italy, Finland, South Africa and New Zealand sent their outstanding doctoral students to the Consortium at Alliance University, and Consortium Fellows had a rare academic opportunity to interact with all top-notch scholars in marketing such as: Jagdish N. Sheth, Emory University USA; V. Kumar, Georgia State University, USA; Kent Monroe, University of Richmond, USA; A. Parasuraman, University of Miami, USA; Raj Shrivastava, Singapore Management University, Singapore; Russ Winer, New York University, USA and Russell Belk, York University, USA, among others.

In welcome address to the delegates, Alliance University, Bangalore highlighted that the Inaugural Doctoral Consortium marks an important milestone in the era of emerging markets and in furthering scholarship in marketing, while alluding to the need for more number of universities with doctoral degree programs, in India and elsewhere, to address the shortage of doctorally-qualified faculty in marketing well as in other areas of management. In the inaugural session, Dr. Kent Monroe, a long-standing marketing legend, was presented by the organizers of the Consortium with a Life Time Achievement in Marketing award, acknowledging his phenomenal contributions to the discipline and his academic journey as a doctoral fellow at the first Doctoral Consortium at Indiana University, USA in 1966 to attending the Consortium at Alliance University as an esteemed doctoral faculty.