Dr. Kumar is currently the Shaw Chair Professor and dean of Nanyang Business School at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. Until May 2013, he was a professor in the Department of Information and Operations Management at the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California. He served as chairman of the department from 1989-1994, vice dean for international programs from 2003-2006, and vice dean for graduate programs from 2004-2006. From 2009-2011, on a leave of absence from USC, he served as distinguished professor and dean of the College of Business at Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology.

He is the author and co-author of more than 60 articles, including publications in Management Science, Marketing Science, the Journal of Economic Theory, Production and Operations Management, the Journal of Operations Management, and the Journal of Management Information Systems. Dr. Kumar serves on the board of several companies and was a former board member of Korea Exchange Bank and Goodwill Industries of Southern California. From 2000 to 2001, he served as a member of a Special Interest Group advising the Indian Ministry for Information Technology on IT hardware and software policies.

Dr. Kumar got his B.Tech degree in mechanical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology in Madras, India, his master of science degree in industrial engineering from the University of Texas, and his Ph.D. from the Industrial Engineering and Management Sciences Department at Northwestern University.