“From Perfection to Retail Competition” is the theme of the 2011 Polykarp Kusch Lecture, which will be delivered by  Dr. Ram C. Rao, Founders Professor and a professor of marketing in the School of Management.

Professor Rao’s research investigates how firms compete and how they should formulate competitive marketing strategies with emphasis on pricing. He has published numerous papers in marketing journals, and his research has received support from the National Science Foundation as well as Nortel Networks. He has been a member of the UT Dallas faculty since 1983.

Rao teaches marketing in the master’s programs and game theory in the doctoral program. He also teaches in the online program and executive MBA program of the School of Management.

Polykarp Kusch was Nobel laureate in physics in 1955 and came to The University of Texas at Dallas in 1972. At UT Dallas, he was Regental Professor and served on the physics faculty. His distinguished science career was comple­mented by his superb teaching. He delighted students with his presentations of physics experiments in his “Phenomena of Nature” classes.

Before coming to UT Dallas, Dr. Kusch had served as professor, vice president, provost and dean of faculties at Columbia University.

When he retired in 1982, UT Dallas established a program of annual lectures with the theme “Concerns of the Lively Mind” to honor Dr. Kusch.