Yuxi (Lucy) Zhao - Tenure Track Candidate Research Presentation - Faculty of Business

The Faculty of Business invites members of the campus community – students, faculty and staff – to attend a virtual research presentation by Yuxi (Lucy) Zhao for a tenure-track position at the assistant professor level with a focus on entrepreneurship.

Candidate Bio:

Yuxi Zhao is an educator, scholar, and practitioner in the field of entrepreneurship. With a PhD from the Ohio State University, she is currently an assistant professor at Bob Gaglardi School of Business and Economics, Thompson Rivers University, British Columbia. She conducted entrepreneurship research funded by the US National Science Foundation, US Department of Agriculture Foundational and Applied Science Program, US Department of Agriculture Federal-State Market Improvement Program, International Foundation for Science (PI), and Environmental Policy Initiative (PI). Yuxi is also a serial entrepreneur who worked as an entrepreneur-in-residence for the Quebec-based AI incubator TandemLaunch Inc. She helped form a new energy extension initiative for the University of Massachusetts Amherst, which raised US$6 million in seed funding. She also helped HaiLa Technology, which was featured on Forbes, and raised CA$12.8 million in seed funding. Her own start-up was adopted as a case study by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Gies College of Business. She was also a judge and mentor for the 24-hour global entrepreneurship competition of EIT Climate-KIC, a Europe-based climate innovation initiative.

Presentation Title:  “Entrepreneur-Led Landscape Changes in Hocking Hills, Ohio: The Co-production of the Tourism Industry and Exurban Community”

Abstract:

Rural tourism is often regarded as a catalyst to stimulate economic growth in amenity-rich but underdeveloped regions. Much research to date has focused on developing a robust rural tourism industry separate from the evolution of the exurban community. Tourism entrepreneurs extend the market mechanisms to the traditionally non-monetary environmental and social contexts of the rural community by commercializing the natural and social heritage. Moreover, an increasingly commercialized landscape can co-produce both the tourism industry and the rural community simultaneously. Therefore, using Hocking Hills, Ohio, as an example to analyze tourism entrepreneurs’ business strategies and corresponding ways of capitalizing on resources, this research connects the long-standing paradigms of tourism development and community evolution and forges a new direction for interdisciplinary theoretical and empirical studies.

The presentation will take place on February 25 from 1:00--2:00pm (Atlantic Time) via the following Zoom link:  

      https://upei.zoom.us/j/66690417606?pwd=Qi90ZnlqWHVyclpwNTFpK3ZqYk51dz09

      Meeting ID: 666 9041 7606

      Passcode: 582416

For further information, please contact Shelly Kavanagh at businessfac@upei.ca.