Sjoerd Beugelsdijk is Professor of International Business and Management at the University of Groningen. Steven Brakman is Professor of International Economics at the University of Groningen. Harry Garretsen is Professor of International Economics and Business at the University of Groningen. Charles van Marrewijk is Professor of International Macroeconomics at Utrecht University School of Economics (since 2008) and Director of the Tjalling Charles Koopmans Institute (since 2009). He studied horticulture and worked as a grower before studying economics in Holland at Erasmus University Rotterdam (1981–1985, BA and MA) and in the United States at Purdue University (1985–1988, MSc and PhD). He worked at the University of Groningen (1987–1990) and at Erasmus University Rotterdam (1990–2008), where he was also Academic Director of the Institute of Housing and Urban Development Studies (2007–2008). His research focuses on international economics, geographical economics, economic growth, development economics, and urban economics. He is currently the European editor of The Journal of International Trade and Economic Development and associate editor of the Journal of Regional Science. He has organized several international conferences and served as a guest editor for various special issues of the above two journals. His research output is widely cited and has appeared in many top (field) journals, including the Journal of International Economics, the Journal of Development Economics, the Journal of Economic Geography, the International Economic Review, the Journal of Economics and Management Strategy, Oxford Economic Papers, Economica, the International Journal of Industrial Organization, the Journal of Population Economics, and the Journal of Regional Science. He has also (co-)authored ten books, eight of which were published either by Cambridge University Press or Oxford University Press (of which two were translated into Chinese).