CES Sponsors 22nd Annual Frontiers in Service Conference

This summer, academic experts and business leaders from 28 countries gathered in Taiwan for the 22nd annual Frontiers in Service Conference, sponsored by the Center for Excellence in Service (CES) at the University of Maryland, College Park.  The Frontiers Conference, which took place from July 4-7 in Taipei, has previously been held in countries all over the world, including the U.S., Sweden, Australia, and the Netherlands.  However, this was the first year the conference was held in Asia. Over 300 people attended. 

Founded in 1992 by Roland Rust, Distinguished University Professor, David Bruce Smith Chair in Marketing, and Executive Director of the CES, the Frontiers in Service Conference is considered the world's leading annual conference on service research.  This year’s co-sponsors include the American Marketing Association, INFORMS Service Science Section, National Science Council, Taiwan, National Taiwan University, and IBM.

At this year’s event, conference attendees had the opportunity to present their research on a variety of cross-functional topics, including service science, service marketing, service information technology, e-service, service innovation, and customer relationship management.  Keynote presentations featured top executives from established Fortune 500 companies such as Ogilvy and IBM.  Speakers also included CES faculty members Professor Roland Rust and P.K. Kannan of the University of Maryland, as well as distinguished CES fellows, A. Parasuraman  from the University of Miami, and Steven Shugan from the University of Florida.   

The success of this year’s conference can be attributed to the outstanding work of the nine-member conference committee, which included co-chairs Ming-Hui Huang of National Taiwan University, Katherine  Lemon of Boston College, and A. Parasuraman, all of whom are distinguished faculty fellows of the CES. Other committee members included Roland Rust, who was the program chair, Mark  Rosenbaum of Northern Illinois University, Gregory Heim of Texas A & M University.  Anthony Lee, and J. Chris Lin represented National Taiwan University.

Next year’s Frontiers in Service Conference will be held at the University of Miami from June 26-29, and will be chaired by A. Parasuraman and Roland Rust.