Professor Helsen earned his BA in Economics from the University of Antwerp, his MBA from Cornell University, and after a short stint with Esso Benelux, his PhD from the Wharton School of Business (University of Pennsylvania).
His research focuses on models of purchase timing, new product adoption, competition and international marketing. He is on the editorial board of The International Journal of Research in Marketing and The Journal of Marketing. He has also co-authored with Masaaki Kotabe a book on Global Marketing Management (Wiley, 2001).