Karen Xie

Associate Professor

OPIM

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Karen Xie is an Associate Professor of Operations and Information Management at the University of Connecticut School of Business, where she researches algorithms and AI, platform economics, and market design. Her work appears in Management Science, has shaped policy decisions by lawmakers including the Denver City Council, and has been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Forbes. She also co-founded an algorithm-driven vacation rental investment company and oversees a growing multimillion-dollar portfolio across North America.

Her current work asks how people learn to work alongside generative AI and who gets taught that skill. That question led her beyond the university classroom to the youngest learners of all. She is the author of a hands-on AI activity book for young children built around three goals: AI literacy, creating with AI, and responsible AI use. Convinced that AI will reshape how children are taught, she advocates a simple principle: children should make something with their own hands first, then see what AI does with it, so they learn to be the judge rather than the audience.

At UConn she has taught graduate and undergraduate courses including Statistics in Business Analytics, Visual Analytics, and Advanced Project Management, redesigning each around how AI is changing the work. She advises student consulting projects for clients including PepsiCo and LEGO. Her research has earned Best Paper Awards from CIST and ICIS, along with competitive funding from Zillow, Facebook(Meta), the Marketing Science Institute, the NET Institute, and the Wharton Customer Analytics Initiative.

Before joining UConn, she was a tenured faculty at the University of Denver and an analyst at Accenture. She holds a Ph.D. from Temple University’s Fox School of Business, an M.Phil. from Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and a bachelor’s degree from Fudan University in Shanghai. Outside of work, she is a ski enthusiast, most often found in winter on the double-black-diamond runs of North America’s great mountains. (LinkedIn)

Areas of Work

Algorithms and AI | Platform Economics | Market Design

Recent Publications

“Engaging physicians with introductory incentives: References to online and offline income” (with Xiaofei Zhang, Bin Gu & Xitong Guo) MIS Quarterly (2025), 49(3), 917-952

“Quality differentiation and matching in peer-to-peer markets: Evidence from Airbnb Plus” (with Hongchang Wang, Benjamin Williams, & Wei Chen) Management Science (2023), 70(7), 4260-4282

“Regulating professional players in peer-to-peer markets: Evidence from Airbnb” (with Wei Chen & Zaiyan Wei) Management Science (2022), 69(5), 2547-3155

“The battle for homes: How does home sharing disrupt local residential markets?” (with Wei Chen & Zaiyan Wei) Management Science (2022), 68(12), 8515-9218 Lead Article

“Recreational cannabis legalization and illicit drugs: Drug usage, mortality, and darknet transactions” (with Louis Liu & Wei Chen) Production and Operations Management (2025), 34(1), 99-119

“How incumbents beat disruption? Evidence from hotel responses to home sharing” (with Jianwei Liu, Wei Chen, Yong Liu, & Yunlong Sun) Production and Operations Management (2023), 32(9), 2758-2774