Professor Merino is the Director of the Master in Marketing Program and a full-time Professor at the  ITAM. Prior to her appointment at the ITAM, she was a Marketing Executive at Procter & Gamble, Sanwa Bank and the Spanish Board for Foreign Trade and Investment.  Professor Merino received a degree in Business Administration and Law from the Universidad Pontificia de Comillas (España), a Master in International Management from the ITAM and a Ph.D. in Marketing from the University of Texas at Austin.

Professor Merino has published in marketing, psychology and economics journals. She is a member of the Mexican System of Researchers. Her primary research focus is in development and application of statistical and psychometric methods for understanding consumer behavior and improving marketing decision-making. Areas of recent research include methods to forecast sales in retail areas and to measure institutional quality at the regional level as an antecedent to corporate investment decisions. She teaches Market Research and Marketing Strategy at the undergraduate and graduate levels at the ITAM.

Professor Merino is an active consultant for the ITAM’s Center for Competitive Studies, where she has participated in several projects for both public institutions and private companies. Her expertise in this area relates to marketing research and metrics, forecasting and industrial benchmarking.