Gaoyang Cai

Welcome!

 

I am Gaoyang Cai, a PhD candidate in Managerial Economics and Strategy at the Kellogg School of Management. I am excited to be on the 2025–2026 academic job market.

My research focuses on the design of platform information environments, governance mechanisms, and business models, as well as their implications for negotiation, competition, innovation, and disintermediation.

I employ field experiments, structural estimation, theoretical modeling, and machine learning methods in my research.

 

Email: gaoyang.cai@kellogg.northwestern.edu

Curriculum Vitae

Google Scholar profile

 

 

Research Interests

Platform Markets; Information Design; Recommendation Algorithm; Platform Governance and Regulation

Job Market Paper

Information Disclosure and Efficiency in Dynamic Price Negotiations: An Experimental and Structural Analysis

  • 47th ISMS Marketing Science Conference, 2025
  • 12th Annual Platform Research Symposium (Boston University, Ph.D. track), 2025 
  • INFORMS Annual Meeting, 2025

Research Papers

Disintermediation Governance and Complementor Innovation: An Empirical Look at Amazon.com, with Xia Han & Grace Gu (Revise & Resubmit at Management Science, Second Round)

  • POMS 33rd Annual Conference, 2023
  • TIM Division Best Student Paper Award Finalist of the AOM 83rd Annual Meeting, 2023
  • Nominated for the SMS 43rd Annual Conference Best Paper Prize, Annual Conference Research Methods Paper Prize and the Annual Conference PhD Paper Prize, 2023
  • INFORMS E-Business, Best Paper Award, 2023

Coupling Information Disclosure with A Quality Standard in R&D Contests, with Jie Zheng, Jingfeng Lu & Qian Jiao (The Journal of Industrial Economics)

Working Papers

Platform Recommendation Algorithm, Niche Market Entry, and Quality Competition, with Xia Han & Grace Gu

  • Marketing Science Institute Research Grant, 2024
  • 85th Annual Meeting of the Academy of Management, 2025
  • 12th Annual Platform Research Symposium (Boston University), 2025
  • Reject & Resubmit at Marketing Science, 2025 

The Cost of Knowing: Competition and Search Frictions in Platform-Mediated Negotiations, with Xia Han, Chongyan Sun & Yingkang Xie (draft coming soon)

  • Advances with Field Experiments Conference (The University of Chicago), 2025

Work in Progress

Work Trails and Labor Matching in the Gig Economy: Evidence from Freelance Artists, with Shi Gu & Edmond Lou (Slides)

Product Ranking Rules and Competition in Two-Sided Markets (Slides)

The Freemium Pricing Strategy and the Opportunity Cost of Time, with Daniel F. Spulber

How Does Vertical Integration Affect Incentives to Innovate?, with Daniel F. Spulber

Stable and Balanced Outcome of Bilateral Bargaining in Networks, with Jie Zheng & Junpeng Xia

Teaching assistantships

Ph.D. course with Professor Isaias N. Chaves: “Static Optimization in Economics”, Fall 2022, Northwestern University

MBA course: “Crisis Management and Business Analytics II”, Fall 2020 and 2021, Northwestern University

Ph.D. course with Professor Jie Zheng: “Information, Contract and Organizational Economics”, Fall, 2018, Tsinghua University.

Undergraduate course with Professor Daokui Li and Professor Jie Zheng: “Intermediate Microeconomics”, Fall, 2018, Tsinghua University.

 

Education

Ph.D., in Managerial Economics & Strategy, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, September 2020 – 2026 (expected)

M.S., Managerial Economics & Strategy, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, September 2020 – June 2022

M.S., Economics, School of Management and Economics (SEM), Tsinghua University, September 2017 – July 2020

B.S., Economics, Nankai University, September 2013 – July 2017

Exchange Student, University of California Berkeley, January 2017 – May 2017