UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — As Gary Lilien, distinguished research professor of management science at the Penn State Smeal College of Business, approached his June 30 retirement date, he said he wanted to leave a legacy that would honor his four decades of service to Smeal’s Institute for the Study of Business Markets (ISBM).

Lilien, along with former colleagues Irwin Gross, ISBM’s founding executive director, and Ralph Oliva, Smeal professor emeritus of marketing and a former ISBM executive director, have pledged a total of more than $250,000 to create the ISBM Founder’s Fund. The fund, which will be available for immediate spending, will support ISBM research and programs, including a biennial academic conference; a biennial Ph.D. camp; a Ph.D. dissertation support competition; periodic special interest workshops; and a series of Ph.D. seminars available to business-to-business (B2B) Ph.D. students globally.

Lilien and Gross, along with the late David Wilson, co-founded the ISBM in 1983 with two goals: play a leadership role in advancing the theory and practice of B2B marketing and advance business marketing as a specialized field within the broader marketing discipline.

When the institute was founded, it was one of the first of its kind and laid the groundwork for an entirely new sector of (B2B) research, according to Lilien.

“The institute leverages Penn State’s knowledge base, allowing us to both engage in the creation of new knowledge in the B2B domain and disseminate that knowledge to practitioners,” he said. "I thought it might last 10 years, but I’m thrilled to say we just celebrated our 41st anniversary.”

Stefan Wuyts, professor of marketing and current director of the ISBM, said that Lilien, Gross and Oliva played key roles in growing the ISBM, and their influence radiated around the world.

“Under their leadership, the ISBM has supported aspiring B2B marketing scholars across the globe, myself included when I started my Ph.D. work at Erasmus University Rotterdam. The fact that these same giants have now created the ISBM Founders Fund is another manifestation of their selfless dedication and their shared passion for B2B marketing,” he said.

According to Wuyts, the ISBM has always had a deep interest in supporting doctoral students “embarking on a research journey in the challenging field of B2B marketing.” Including the support he received as a doctoral student, the ISBM has funded 127 doctoral students across 56 different universities in its more than 40-year history.

In the ISBM’s next chapter, Wuyts said he plans to expand that reach.

“We are very grateful to Gary Lilien, Irv Gross and Ralph Oliva and look forward to this exciting next chapter,” Wuyts said.

Lilien has an engineering background, but after several years working as an assistant and associate professor at MIT’s Sloan School of Management where his research and teaching were focused on what he called “the underserved field” of B2B marketing, he sought an environment more conducive to facilitating connections between academics and practitioners in the B2B field.

This dream would lead him to Penn State in 1981 and lay the foundation for the ISBM. More than 40 years later, Lilien’s passion for B2B marketing, the ISBM and his pride in its impact are palpable.

“When I spoke at the event commemorating the ISBM’s 30th anniversary in 2013, I recall reporting that we had connected more than 5,000 B2B practitioners with over 1,200 B2B academics,” he said. “At that juncture, we had also given more than $10 million in grants to 300 B2B scholars and Ph.D. students globally. The ISBM’s reach has only grown since then, and its future impact is limitless. I am proud to have been a part of it.”

Gross was an associate professor at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania before taking a position as director of the corporate marketing research division at the DuPont Company in the mid-1970s.

"My long-term concern that the academic marketing world was ignoring B2B marketing prompted me to leave academia to study B2B marketing from the inside at DuPont, with the intent of returning to influence academia in that regard,” Gross said. “After nine years at DuPont, I wrote a proposal to found an academic center, supported by DuPont, devoted to B2B marketing, which I sent to three universities. Having known Gary Lilien for several years and Dave Wilson by reputation, Penn State had to be included. I learned that Gary and Dave were already thinking along the same lines, so it was natural for us to join forces.” 

He joined the University as a professor of marketing and founding executive director of the ISBM in 1983 and retired after 13 years in the role.

Oliva began his professional career at Texas Instruments, where he taught design engineers how to use integrated circuits. Over time, his focus and expertise shifted from technology to B2B marketing, and he was promoted to corporate vice president of marketing communications and design for Texas Instruments worldwide.

After Gross visited and described what ISBM was doing, Oliva had Texas Instruments join the ISBM and became among the most enthusiastic participants in its activities.    

Once Oliva began considering a career transition, he reached out to Gross.

“The timing was just right,” he said. “Irv was looking to retire, and he offered me the chance to be executive director of the institute.”

Oliva spent close to 25 years in the role, which also allowed him to teach elective courses in the Smeal MBA Program and support the launch of an Executive MBA Program in Philadelphia.

According to Oliva, the member firms who join ISBM help to fund B2B research across a network of hundreds of academic researchers.

“Occasionally, an opportunity will arise where the director needs to provide special support — particularly for new researchers early in their career,” he said. “This special fund will allow a fast response for situations with high leverage for the research community.”

Lilien, the last of the three founders to be actively engaged with the institute, said he wanted to ensure the ISBM continues pursuing its mission long after his retirement.

“As I leave Penn State, I am confident the ISBM’s focus on leadership in B2B research and practice is in good hands at Penn State. The current research director and research team are all so pleased to have these resources to support their work, and that makes me very happy,” Lilien said. "That's what a legacy is, isn’t it? There is a statement you want to make or something you feel strongly about, and you do what you can to ensure that work in that area can continue.

“Irv, Ralph and I feel strongly about this, and we hope others who have been associated with or benefited from the institution’s work over the years will also consider supporting this work.”

Gifts to the ISBM Founders Fund advance the University’s historic land-grant mission to serve and lead. Through philanthropy, alumni and friends are helping students to join the Penn State family and prepare for lifelong success; driving research, outreach and economic development; and increasing the University’s impact for students, families, patients and communities across the commonwealth and around the world. Learn more by visiting raise.psu.edu.