Introduction to Conference Theme:

Indus Business Academy -Bangalore is proud to organize the 13^th International Conference on Marketing - MARKCON 2020 at its Bangalore campus. The conference brings together academic scholars and practitioners in the area of marketing from around the world to discuss contemporary issues related to marketing ecosystem and innovation with India and the Global perspectives. The goal is to advance the understanding of Marketing Ecosystem and Innovations to collaborate and corroborate the research in this direction.

Akin to ecosystems in nature, ecosystems do exist in marketing & business. A well-established marketing ecosystem contributes towards the building of the brand through comprehensive association with the value chain and the supply chain resulting in competitive advantage. It also helps in gaining visibility, engage prospects, capture attention and create customers. Marketing ecosystems also provide for a careful assessment and understanding of the internal and external environments to put the value proposition in the right perspective to the customers.

Innovations that are sustained results in competitive advantage and thus can bring about disruptions in the markets. Innovations result in product and process improvement and thus serve the unserved segments by enhancing their consumer surplus. Corporations will have to embrace innovation as a strategy towards a sustainable future.

Although, innovations are the prime movers for long term existence of corporations, they need to be evolved through ecosystems that nurture and channelize them to the right customers at the right time and right place. Therefore, Innovations offering unique value propositions need marketing ecosystems to evolve and position in the markets.

India being an emerging economy is currently experiencing myriads of sociological and cultural changes which entails for new Innovations and new ecosystems. These changing business landscapes are resulting in changes in business practices and marketing strategies. Given, the size of the consumer base and the rise of the middle class in terms of purchasing power, India has become a sought after destination for businesses across the globe. However, in India, the enormity in cultural diversity, ever changing political landscapes, under-evolved market designs & structures, disruptive technologies, sustainability & ecological challenges and inadequate legal frameworks pose significant challenges for businesses. Although there exits ample number of opportunities for marketing in India, there are challenges galore and they need to be acknowledged by the companies from both, local and multi-national origins.

Currently the need of the hour is, to look at the emerging trends in the field of Marketing ecosystems and Innovations from India perspective. A bi-direction approach is necessary towards practicing marketing in India, where in, on one end, there is a need to re-structure and stream line the markets for efficiency and to identify an Indian way of doing marketing and thus promulgating the same to the big global picture. On the other hand, significant efforts are required to infuse innovations in the global marketing practices to suit the Indian / local market requirements.

There exists a big gap referring to the marketing ecosystems and innovations from India perspective connecting with the globe. Therefore, bigger research opportunities exist for both academia and the corporate to understand the perspectives and dimensions of marketing innovations in Indian scenario. Currently, there is a clear inevitability towards development, compilation and documentation of Indian perspectives on marketing ecosystems and innovations, which, not only can act as guiding principles for corporate, but also can, provide pedagogical directions to academia and thus bring about the alignment between marketing theory and practice.