Fasheng Xu
Associate Professor of Operations and Information Management
School of Business, University of Connecticut
Fasheng Xu is an Associate Professor of Operations and Information Management at School of Business, University of Connecticut (UConn). Fasheng’s general research interests lie in the interface of operations, finance, and economics, with a particular focus on the economic and social implications of emerging technologies. His current research examines how Generative AI reshapes organizational structure and market dynamics, the rise of the agentic economy, the governance and optimization of agentic systems, and the economics and financing of AI supply chains.
His work has been published in top-tier academic journals such as Management Science and M&SOM, and he has received multiple best paper nominations along with prestigious research awards, including the 2025 Chelliah Sriskandarajah Early Career Research Accomplishments Award. At UConn, Fasheng designed and launched a new MBA course on Supply Chain Finance. He also recently co-authored a book, The Owner: A Business Novel about Work in the GenAI Era, which translates these research themes into narrative form for broader audiences.
- PositionAssociate Professor (with Tenure), OPIM · University of Connecticut, School of Business, 2026 –
Assistant Professor, OPIM · University of Connecticut, School of Business, 2023 – 2026 - PreviouslyAssistant Professor of SCM · Syracuse University, Whitman School of Management, 2019 – 2023
- Ph.D.Operations Management · Washington University in St. Louis, Olin Business School, 2019
- B.S.Industrial Engineering · Shanghai Jiao Tong University, 2013
Areas of Focus
My research lies at the interface of operations, finance, and economics, with a focus on the economic and social implications of emerging technologies. It spans six connected themes.
Generative AI
Economics of GenAI, organizational adoption, AI agents, agentic commerce, and the AI supply chain.
Blockchain & Crypto
Smart contracts, asset tokenization, crypto markets, Web3, DAOs, and DeFi.
Supply Chain Finance
Reverse factoring, trade finance, deep-tier SCF, and sustainable SCF.
FinTech
FinTech lending, open banking, social trading, and market microstructure.
Data Economics
GDPR, consumer privacy, differential privacy, and data markets.
Digital Platforms
Crowdfunding, livestream commerce, online influencers, and creator economy.
Publications & Working Papers
Filter by topic. Many papers span more than one theme.
Working at the AI frontier
Generative AI runs through much of my current research — the economics of foundation models, AI agents and agentic commerce, and how GenAI is reshaping organizations and the future of work. It is also the subject of my first book.
The Owner
A Business Novel about Work in the GenAI Era
“AI changes tasks. Workflows need owners.”
Written by teachers as much as practitioners, The Owner asks what organizations must change about themselves before AI can change anything for them. Talking with leaders living these tensions, we kept hearing the same pattern: the failures were rarely about the model — they were about who owned the process it was part of, and what happened when nobody did. AI doesn’t remove work; it moves work, accelerating the unclear authority and misaligned incentives that were already there. The story follows a consulting firm trying to survive a market that rewards speed over responsibility, and the people who must decide what they are willing to answer for — beginning with pilots and demos and the optimism of a powerful new tool, and ending somewhere harder and more honest. The characters and companies are fictional. The patterns are not.
PhD Workshop on GenAI and the Agentic Future
This workshop provides a broad overview of how generative AI is reshaping research, organizations, markets, and infrastructure. We begin by examining the state of AI in 2026, situating GenAI within the larger technological landscape, identifying the organizational barriers that limit adoption, and engaging the “bitter lesson” perspective on intelligence. We then turn to agentic research workflows, exploring how AI agents can support the research process, how researchers can build reusable agent skills, and what autonomous research may imply for the future of science itself. The workshop next considers the emerging agentic economy, where AI agents reshape organizational design, mediate commerce, and give rise to new forms of economic activity. Finally, we examine the AI supply chain, focusing on the infrastructure, financing, and systemic risks that make large-scale AI possible, with particular attention to data centers and the GPU economy. Together, these sections offer a big-picture framework for understanding GenAI not only as a tool, but as a transformative force across knowledge work, markets, organizations, and society.
Honors & awards
Selected recognition for research and service across the operations, information systems, and management-science communities.
Chelliah Sriskandarajah Early Career Research Accomplishments Award
The most prestigious early-career research award in the operations management community, presented annually to a single early-career scholar worldwide in recognition of exceptional research accomplishments and scholarly impact.
- 2026M&SOM Meritorious Service Award
- 2025Best Paper Award, Runner-upUConn School of Business
- 2022Guttag Junior Faculty AwardWhitman School of Management, Syracuse University
- 2022Finalist, MSOM iFORM SIG Best Paper Award Competition
- 2021Finalist, INFORMS Junior Faculty Interest Group Paper Competition
- 2020Winner, POMS PITM Best Student Paper Competition
Also: multiple Meritorious Service Awards from Management Science and M&SOM (2022–2026), and student best-paper honors from POMS and INFORMS competitions.
In the classroom
Bringing frontier technology into the business curriculum — from generative AI and blockchain to supply chain finance and analytics.
- Generative AI for BusinessUndergraduate · Master · Executive
- Blockchain, Crypto & Web3 for BusinessUndergraduate · Master
- Supply Chain FinanceUndergraduate · Master
- Operations & Supply Chain ManagementUndergraduate · Master