Michel Wedel

Education

Wedel holds an MS.C. in Biomathematics from the University of Leiden. He has a Ph.D. in Marketing from Wageningen University.

Research

Wedel develops statistical and econometric methods for research in marketing, and applies these methods to support firms' decision- making. He has worked in the areas of market segmentation, advertising and promotions, visual marketing, multidimensional scaling, conjoint analysis, and big data analytics.

Academic career

From 1982-1991, Wedel was employed at the Department of Human Nutrition, of the Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research (TNO), in Zeist, the Netherlands, where he became head of the statistics unit in the Department of Human Nutrition. In 1991 he became Professor of Marketing Research and Market Structure Analysis, Department of Economics, University of Groningen, The Netherlands, where he worked until 2002. In 2003 Wedel was appointed as the Dwight F. Benton Professor of Marketing at the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA. In 2006 he moved to the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland, where he became the Pepsico Chaired Professor of Consumer Science. Wedel is area/associate editor of Marketing Science, Journal of Marketing Research and Journal of Marketing.

Awards and honors

Wedel was ranked the number one Marketing scholar in the world based on number of publications, third Marketing scholar in the world based on publication rate, the number one economist in the Netherlands, and the number one Netherlands marketing scholar based on number of publications. Wedel received the Dr Hendrik Muller Prize for outstanding contributions to the social sciences from the Royal Dutch Academy of the Sciences, the Charles C. Parlin award for exceptional contributions to Marketing Research from the American Marketing Association and the Churchill Award for lifetime contributions to the study of marketing research from the American Marketing Association. He is a fellow of the American Statistical Association and the Institute for Operations Research and Management Science, Society for Marketing Science. The University of Maryland has recognized him with the Distinguished Scholar Teacher Award and named him a Distinguished University Professor.

Kyokushin karate career

Wedel holds a 4th dan in Kyokushin Karate and was a heavy-weight full contact karate competitor. He won the Dutch (open) full contact Karate championships nine times between 1978 and 1987, his only loss in the being to Gerard Gordeau (Netherlands) in the final in 1980. Wedel won the International Ibusz Oyama cup in Budapest (Hungary) in 1982 after beating Michael Thompson (England), won the open European Karate Championships in Alkmaar (Netherlands) in 1983. In 1985 he became 2nd after losing to Andy Hug (Switzerland) in the Ibusz Oyama cup, and he won that cup again in 1986. He became the European heavyweight champion in Katowice (Poland) in 1987, after beating Michael Thompson (England) in the final. In 1986, together with Peter Smit participated in the 18th All Japan Tournament in Tokyo, and he participated in the 2nd (1979), 3^d (1983) and 4th (1987) World Open Karate Championships in Japan. He lost to Akira Masuda (Japan) in 1983, he lost to Ademir da Costa (Brazil) in 1987, finishing both times among the first 16 competitors. Out of his last 25 fights, Wedel lost one, was disqualified in one, won one by decision and won 22 by knock-out.

Wedel became the coach of the Dutch National Karate team (1988-1991) He wrote the book: “Kyokushin Karate: Training and Fighting” with Koen Scharrenberg, and made Kyokushin training instruction videos with Andy Hug. In 1994, he joined the democratic ShinKyokushin organization under leadership of Kenji Midori.