Abstract:

The paper summarizes personal views about market research on its way from a multinational/ local data provider service towards representing a transnational business insights function.The various fields of current research activities (for a FMCG company) are outlined and classified according to the business information needs. Some of the many changes in FMCG business encountered in the past five to ten years are summarized and the potential future consequences for the tasks, the tools, and the 'players' are outlined, involving major changes on all sides: corporate marketing, corporate market research, research suppliers. The main issue is to maximize the added value that a corporation gains via research investments: it will not be enough to '... throw data over the wall'. Changing conditions suggest that market research migrates towards an integrated business insights consultant - regardless whether corporate or institutional.