Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Christian Homburg was honored for his achievements at the Global Alliance of Marketing and Management Associations (GAMMA) conference. He was the first European scientist to receive the GAMMA Lifetime Achievement Award at a ceremony in Tokyo. The GAMMA awards this prize to outstanding researchers who have made an extraordinary contribution to international top-level research in marketing and management with their life's work.
In his laudation, Professor Arch G. Woodside from the Curtin University in Perth especially emphasized the following aspects: Professor Homburg has published 33 articles in the two most renowned journals in marketing science alone, as well as several research and professional articles in other scientific and practice-oriented journals. In 2006, Professor Homburg received an honorary doctorate from Copenhagen Business School for his outstanding commitment to science and academic teaching. He received his second honorary doctorate from the Technical University of Freiberg in 2008. According to Google Scholar, the attention and scope of Professor Homburg's work is reflected in the more than 43,000 citations of his articles.
In the keynote on the occasion of the award ceremony, Professor Homburg admonished to tackle deficiencies in the marketing science in a determined and quick way. Especially the declining relevance of research and training for the marketing practice should be counteracted by more specific study offers for junior managers to topics such as pricing and business to business marketing. Professor Homburg also repeatedly stressed the need for scientists to get out of their ivory towers and talk to managers in economy. Otherwise, science will keep losing its touch with reality.
However, Professor Homburg is far from finished with his life’s work. There are still too much unanswered and exciting questions in marketing research. “I am delighted to receive the GAMMA Lifetime Achievement Award. It is a confirmation of the previous and future consistent orientation of our chair's work towards practically relevant and scientifically interesting topics,” Professor Homburg said.