Gemma is one of the foremost pioneers of Neuromarketing. A world-renowned Neuroscientist and specialist in the application of brain science to business, Gemma is an academic, consultant, speaker and entrepreneur.
She has a BSc in Social Psychology from the London School of Economics, a PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Oxford and is an accredited Chartered Psychologist.
Gemma is currently a Professor of Neuromarketing at the Nanyang Business School, NTU in Singapore and Director for Neuroscience at Split Second Research Limited which she co-founded in 2016 together with Dr Eamon Fulcher and Geraldine Trufil. The company is based in the UK and has offices in the Philippines, Singapore and Brazil. She was the former Director for R&D at the Institute of Asian Consumer Insight which was set up by Singapore’s Economic Development Board in 2012 and held this post from 2014-2018. Gemma also undertakes consultancy projects and works closely with many multinationals and government agencies on consumer neuroscience and market research.
Career
She started her career in marketing on the agency side as an account executive and manager at the marketing consultancy firm Francis Killingbeck Bain in the late 1980’s. She later returned to the academic world, obtaining her DPhil in Cognitive Neuroscience from the Department of Psychology at the University of Oxford.
In 1999 she co-founded Neurosense – one of the world’s first neuromarketing companies – with Professor Michael Brammer and Dr Peter Hansen.
Between 1998 – 2007, she was the Director of the Multisensory Brain Imaging lab at Oxford’s Functional Brain Imaging Centre (FMRIB) and a Research Fellow of the Medical Research Council of Great Britain and the Wellcome Trust, UK.
In 2010, Gemma took a sabbatical from academia and concentrated full time on managing Neurosense before moving to Singapore in 2012 to help launch neuromarketing in Asia in collaboration with the Singapore’s Economic Development Board.
Professor Calvert has published over 50 academic papers on human brain function including in the prestigious journals Science and Nature Neuroscience and contributed some of the inaugural papers in the field of human functional brain imaging.
In 2008, she was conferred with the Chair of Neuromarketing at the Warwick Manufacturing Group, University of Warwick.
Professional Awards
- Fellow of the Royal Society for Arts & Business
- Fellow of Centre for Science and Policy, UK
- Member Global Agenda Council for Neuroscience & Behaviour, World Economic Forum
- Member of Inaugural Advisory Board of the NMSBA
- Chartered Psychologist of the British Psychological Society
- Wellcome Trust Career Development Fellowship award
- Medical Research Council UK Fellowship award
- Medical Research Council UK Studentship
- Young Investigator Award Schizophrenia Research
- McDonnell-Pew Foundation Studentship
In 2016 Gemma was included in the list of 50 of Asia’s Women Leaders.
