Assistant Professor at University of Mississippi, United States
Shu (Sue) Deng is an Assistant Professor at the School of Business Administration, University of Mississippi. With an academic background rooted in strategy and corporate finance, Deng’s scholarly trajectory reflects a consistent focus on entrepreneurship, innovation, and digital transformation within creative industries. Since her appointment in 2024, she has been actively engaged in research exploring the intersection of technology and entrepreneurial behavior, with a special interest in how digitization reshapes innovation strategy and venture dynamics. As an emerging scholar, Deng contributes meaningfully to the fields of strategic management and entrepreneurship through high-quality publications, collaborative research, and regular participation in global academic conferences.
Profile
Orcid
Education
Deng’s educational journey began at Nanjing University, where she earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Corporate Finance in 2014, graduating with Highest Distinction. Her academic curiosity led her to the United States, where she pursued and completed her doctoral studies at the University of Texas at Dallas. In 2024, she was awarded a Ph.D. in Strategy, laying a strong theoretical and empirical foundation for her research in organizational behavior and entrepreneurial ecosystems. Her advanced training equipped her with a diverse methodological toolkit and a global perspective on management science, enabling her to address complex questions at the intersection of innovation and market behavior.
Experience
Professionally, Deng’s academic appointment as Assistant Professor at the University of Mississippi since 2024 has allowed her to further develop her research agenda and teaching portfolio. She has become an integral part of the university’s scholarly community, mentoring students and contributing to academic service through peer review and conference organizing roles. Prior to this position, she cultivated research collaborations with internationally recognized scholars during her doctoral studies, co-authoring multiple papers that have been featured in top-tier journals. Her experience reflects a blend of rigorous research, active dissemination of knowledge, and dedicated service to the academic profession.
Research
Deng’s research interests lie primarily in the domains of entrepreneurship in creative industries, innovation strategy, and technology-based entrepreneurship. Her work explores how digital tools and technological shifts impact entrepreneurial opportunity formation, patent strategies, and venture capital investment outcomes. She is particularly fascinated by the ways in which startups navigate innovation in increasingly digitized environments and how market intermediaries affect entrepreneurial strategy and performance. In addition, her research extends into interfirm hiring practices and audience perception in category-spanning ventures, signifying her interest in behavioral and institutional perspectives of strategic management.
Awards
Among her awards and recognitions, one of the most notable is the 2022 EIX Schulze Outstanding Applied and Practical Publication Award, which she received for the article “Should You Sell or Hold That Patent?” published in the Entrepreneur & Innovation Exchange. This award highlights her commitment to research that bridges academic insight and real-world application. Additionally, Deng received the Best Reviewer Award from Industry and Innovation in 2023, recognizing her contributions to maintaining academic quality in peer-reviewed journals. These accolades underscore her rising profile as a thoughtful and impactful scholar in strategic and entrepreneurial research.
Publication
Deng’s scholarly output includes several significant publications. In 2025, she co-authored Startup innovation in the digital era (Kwon, J. H., Deng, S., & Park, H. D.), which is forthcoming in the Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal, and expected to offer deep insights into how digital transformation influences entrepreneurial behavior. In 2022, her article When Do Firms Trade Patents? (Kwon, J. H., Park, H. D., & Deng, S.) was published in Organization Science, 33(3), 1212–1231, providing a quantitative analysis of patent trading strategies among firms, cited by over 40 articles to date. The same year, she contributed to the award-winning piece Should You Sell or Hold That Patent? in Entrepreneur & Innovation Exchange, a widely cited practical guide for technology entrepreneurs. Other projects under review include investigations into interfirm hiring based on information environments and the technological uniqueness of startups in venture capital decisions, targeting high-impact journals such as Organization Science.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Shu Deng’s academic journey is characterized by a steady rise as an influential voice in strategy and entrepreneurship. Through her education, professional experiences, and scholarly contributions, she has established herself as a forward-thinking researcher addressing pressing questions in the age of digital entrepreneurship. Her active engagement in research, award-winning publications, and service as a peer reviewer further reinforce her commitment to excellence in academic scholarship. Deng’s trajectory signals a promising future as she continues to shape conversations in strategic management and entrepreneurial studies.