Operations and Information Management

PhD Coordinator: Jing Peng jing.peng@uconn.edu

Mission: To prepare students to conduct high quality, state-of-the-art research, and to assume faculty positions at leading institutions in the areas of Information Systems and Operations Management.

The Operations and Information Management (OPIM) Ph.D. Program at UConn provides its students with the training necessary to conduct cutting-edge research in the broad areas of Management Information Systems (MIS) and Operations Management (OM). Students are guided through a curriculum that combines the research methods of Economics, Computer Science, Operations Management, Operations Research, and Statistics, with an emphasis on the scientific management of real businesses.

After completing their coursework and qualifying examinations, our Ph.D. students engage in original research that focuses on emerging technologies and algorithms, and their effects on businesses and the economy. Recent graduates have successfully defended dissertations with topics including: markets for distributed computing, online commerce, healthcare decision support, and measuring and managing the influence of “blogs.”

The OPIM department is unique in its wide range of interests and highly collaborative research environment. Students can work with professors on a research topic from the following list, or develop a related research topic in their own area of interest.

Xinxin Li
Professor, OPIM; Treibick Family Chair in Business
Ph.D., The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

Research topics

  • Auction theory and applications
  • Database design and security
  • Database management
  • Distributed computing and client/server technology
  • Electronic commerce
  • Economics of information and information systems
  • Healthcare information systems
  • Management of technology
  • Manufacturing systems, planning and strategy
  • Supply chain management
  • and More

Placement

Graduates have accepted faculty positions at Arizona State University, California Polytechnic State University, SUNY-Albany, SUNY-Buffalo, Northeastern University, and the Universities of Kansas, Maine, Texas, Utah, and Washington, as well as other major academic institutions.

OPIM PhD Faculty

Miao Bai
Assistant Professor
PhD, Lehigh University
Research Interests: leveraging mathematical optimization, data analytics, and machine learning to develop effective and efficient solutions for complex problems arising in healthcare systems and medicine, including capacity and access management, real-time hospital operations management and medical decision making

David Bergman
Associate Professor & PhD Coordinator, OPIM Department 
PhD, Carnegie Mellon University
Research Interests: decision diagrams, discrete optimization, integer programming, integration
of optimization techniques

Sudip Bhattacharjee
Professor, Chief of the Center for Big Data Research–US Census Bureau
PhD, State University of New York at Buffalo
Research Interests: data analytics in IT and operations, energy informatics, economics of digital goods and intellectual property rights, information systems economics, sustainable supply chains, process modeling and system dynamics

Carlos Cardonha
Assistant Professor
PhD, Technische Universitat Berlin
Research Interests: operations research, discrete optimization, integer programming, computational complexity, approximation algorithms, online algorithms, revenue management (assortment optimization)

Wei Chen
Associate Professor
PhD, University of California, San Diego
Research Interests: platforms, crowds, and financial technologies. Current research projects focus on home-sharing platforms, real estate markets, and crypto markets

Jose M. Cruz
Associate Professor and Associate Dean of Graduate Studies
PhD, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Research Interests: supply chain management, corporate social responsibility & sustainability, networks economics, systems dynamics, project management, business analytics

Robert Day
Professor and Associate Dean for Undergraduate Programs, Co-Director, Management and Engineering for Manufacturing
PhD, University of Maryland
Research Interests: combinatorial auctions, optimization and auction theory, auction software development, matching and allocation problems, decision analysis, expected utility theory, network optimization, game theory and operations research, theory of computational complexity, and healthcare management

Moustapha Diaby
Associate Professor
PhD, State University of New York at Buffalo
Research Interests: mathematical programming, manufacturing systems modeling and analysis, operations and supply chain management

Cuihong Li
Professor and Department Head
PhD, Carnegie Mellon University
Research Interests: operations management, supply chain management, procurement and sourcing, incentives and mechanism design

Xinxin Li
Treibick Family Chair Professor and MSBAPM Academic Director
PhD, University of Pennsylvania
Research Interests: online word of mouth; social media, digital platforms, economics of information systems, information systems and marketing, pricing and competitive strategies

Chen Liang
Assistant Professor
PhD, Arizona State University
Research Interests: gig economy, platform economy, bias and discrimination, and artificial intelligence

Bowen Lou
Assistant Professor
PhD, University of Pennsylvania
Research interests: economics of digitization and technologies, innovation, future of work, computational social science, econometrics, machine learning, natural language processing, network science

Tao Lu
Assistant Professor
PhD, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
Research interests: supply chain management, transport logistics, sharing economy and socially responsible operations

Manuel Nunez
Associate Professor
PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Research Interests: operations research, statistical modeling and simulation, analytics and business intelligence, computer programming and data structures, genetic algorithms, security and confidentiality in database systems, operations management and manufacturing, supply chain management, convex optimization, stochastic models

Jing Peng
Assistant Professor
PhD, University of Pennsylvania
Research Interests: econometrics, Ecommerce, social media, gig economy, digital health

Ramesh Shankar
Associate Professor
PhD, NYU
Research Interest: pricing and licensing of software and digital goods, environmental impact of durable goods, online user behavior using research methods such as game theory, industrial organization economics, experimental methods, econometrics

Jaeung Sim
PhD, KAIST
Research Interests: information and decisions, online platforms, digital marketing, energy economics, econometrics, field experiments

Jan Stallaert
Professor
PhD, UCLA
Research Interest: information systems, eCommerce, electronic auctions, mathematical programming and applications, information technology

Lakshman Thakur
Associate Professor
Eng.Sc.D., Columbia University
Research Interest: development and applications of linear, nonlinear, and integer programming methods in management science and function approximations in optimization mathematics

Alex Tung
Associate Professor
PhD, University of Kentucky
Research Interest: innovations in e-markets

Karen Xie
Associate Professor, OPIM Department
PhD, Temple University
Research Interests: platform economics, market design, housing markets, finTech

Fasheng Xu
Assistant Professor
PhD, Washington University in St. Louis
Research Interests: blockchain, fintech, supply chain finance, digital platforms, and economics of data and privacy

Quick Facts OPIM

Program Entry

Fall

Length of Program

4-5 Years

Number of Alumni

42

Placement at Research University (Past 5 years)

UMass Lowell, Florida Atlantic, Texas State, Texas Tech

Percentage Women

45%

Competitive Graduate Assistantships

Tuition Waiver, Stipend, Subsidized Health Insurance

Summer Fellowships

Competitive

Conference Travel Support

Yes

Enrollment Profile OPIM (Fall 2022)

Total Applications

41

Total Enrolled

4%

GMAT (3-year enrolled student average)

690

GRE Q (3-year enrolled student average)

167.5

Graduate GPA (3-year enrolled student average)

3.66

Undergraduate GPA (3-year enrolled student average)

3.6

Apply Online

grad.business.uconn.edu/apply

Business PhD applications are accepted from September until the fall cohort is complete.

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