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A Touch of Class by Cody Morris. A bi-weekly look at the McCombs School experience. |
October 15, 2001
Leapfrogging to the Top
Raji Srinivasan
Assistant Professor of Marketing
Thirteen years after managing her own Indian business, Raji Srinivasan ventured to the United States to continue her education, but most importantly to continue following her research interests. Now an assistant professor of marketing at The University of Texas McCombs School of Business, Srinivasan has found an ideal combination of academic and research tasks. Having recently raised over $50,000 to fund three current research projects, she has found her niche.
In 2000, Srinivasan completed her doctoral degree at Pennsylvania State University and came to McCombs because of the school's emphasis on strategy research.
The first of Srinivasan's current research projects looks at the advantages and disadvantages of being the original product on the market. Srinivasan is examining whether it is more beneficial for firms to let others develop the market and measure the results or to be the market pioneer. To weigh the options, Srinivasan studied 52 similar corporations and products that have taken both the wait and see and pioneer approaches. Example corporations include JVC (VHS) and Kodak (Camcorder). Srinivasan found that the majority of successful approaches came when corporations waited for competitors to explore the market, then adjusted their product accordingly and "leapfrogged" the pioneer. Both the UT Vice President of Research and Pennsylvania State University have provided funds for Srinivasan's research effort.
Srinivasan's second and third research endeavors both study different aspects of strategic marketing decisions. The first looks at marketing metrics including corporate decisions to write off marketing expenses rather than classify them as assets. Srinivasan argues that marketing affects organizational performances and should not be devalued.
The third project examines the influence of marketing strategy announcements on shareholder value. These announcements reflect billion dollar market moves that Srinivasan aims to find answers to, when and why the market acts this way? Recent examples include the Compaq and Hewlett-Packard merger and shareholder moves made after their merger announcement. Srinivasan is working with Bizrate.com and received $30,000 in research funding from the Marketing Science Institute in Massachusetts.
Although the majority of Srinivasan's time is divided among these three research projects she has taught marketing for the past four years and will continue again this spring. Undergraduate and MBA students in the McCombs School of Business will have the opportunity to take the professor's Marketing and the Internet course as well as a course in Graduate Marketing and High-Tech Services. Srinivasan thoroughly enjoys teaching and sharing her insight with future marketing leaders. Srinivasan was also the recipient of the 1999 AMA Doctoral Consortium Fellow award.
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