Meet Hunt College's New Faculty for 2026

New perspectives

Research and experience that widen the conversation.

Hunt College is welcoming eight new faculty members for the 2026–27 academic year, adding expertise across artificial intelligence, digital platforms, economics, supply chains, entrepreneurship, marketing, and cross-border business. Their backgrounds span research universities and industry, bringing new perspectives to the college's classrooms and research.

Marketing, Management and Supply Chain

Bhavna Phogaat, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Marketing

Bhavna Phogaat studies what happens when public policy changes the marketplace — how consumers respond, how firms adjust, and how those changes affect behavior and outcomes.

Her research combines marketing with econometrics, causal inference, machine learning, social media analytics, and natural language processing. Her work has been published in the Journal of Marketing and presented at the ISMS Marketing Science Conference, AMA Marketing Strategy Consortium, Haring Symposium, and Theory + Practice in Marketing. She has been recognized as an AMA-Sheth Foundation Doctoral Consortium Fellow and Haring Symposium Fellow.

Phogaat earned her Ph.D. in business administration with a concentration in marketing from the University of South Carolina. She also holds an M.Sc. in applied operational research and a B.Sc. in mathematics from the University of Delhi in India. Her quantitative background extends to the classroom through experience in marketing research, customer analytics, and predictive modeling.

Marketing, Management and Supply Chain

Xi Wang, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Management

Technology can create new markets, but Xi Wang is particularly interested in what happens after those markets begin taking shape. Her research examines digital platform ecosystems and how platform owners, complementors, and users create and capture value through technological innovation.

A second stream of her research focuses on entrepreneurship, including how characteristics of entrepreneurs affect venture evaluation, access to resources, and early-stage outcomes. Together, her work explores the strategic decisions behind new technologies and emerging ventures.

Wang earned her Ph.D. in strategic management from Rice University's Jones Graduate School of Business. She also holds an M.S. in economics from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and a B.A. in history from Nanjing University in China.

Accounting and Information Systems

An Nguyen, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Accounting and Information Systems

Artificial intelligence and digital platforms are changing not only how organizations operate, but how people interact within them. Those intersections are central to An Nguyen's research.

Nguyen examines platform moderation, human interaction with AI systems, and the organizational and ethical questions created by emerging technologies. Her work has been published in the Journal of Management Information Systems and presented at international conferences, including the Pacific Asia Conference on Information Systems. She was also recognized as a Wisconsin Distinguished Fellow.

She earned her Ph.D. in computer information systems from Georgia State University, an MBA from the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and a B.A. in international business economics from Foreign Trade University. Her work brings together technology, organizational decision-making, and human behavior at a time when those areas are increasingly difficult to separate.

Marketing, Management and Supply Chain

Fujun Lai, Ph.D.

Professor of Operations and Supply Chain Management

Fujun Lai brings an extensive research record in supply chain management, logistics, enterprise systems, and digital transformation to Hunt College.

His scholarship has appeared in journals including the Journal of Operations Management, Production and Operations Management, Decision Sciences, and the Journal of Management Information Systems. His work has also earned Top Cited Article, Highly Cited Paper, and Best Application Research Paper distinctions.

Lai earned his Ph.D. in supply chain management from City University of Hong Kong and previously served on the faculties of the University of Southern Mississippi and Tennessee State University. At UTEP, his research adds to the college's growing work around supply chains, technology, and the movement of goods across increasingly complex markets.

Accounting and Information Systems

Thomas George

Visiting Assistant Professor of Information Systems

For Thomas George, questions about emerging technology are also questions about people: how they work, make decisions, create, and navigate new ethical challenges.

His research focuses on artificial intelligence, the future of work, and IT-enabled ethics. Current projects examine topics including generative AI and creativity, artificial delays, and blockchain technologies, with an emphasis on how new technologies change organizational and workplace behavior.

George is completing his Ph.D. in information systems at the University of Arkansas, with his dissertation defense expected in fall 2026. He brings those research interests to Hunt College as an assistant professor of information systems.

Economics and Finance

Pradyot Sharma, Ph.D.

Visiting Assistant Professor of Economics

Pradyot Sharma approaches economics through questions with direct policy implications, from labor market regulation to broadband access and voter behavior.

His primary research examines how technological change interacts with labor regulations. Other projects explore the effects of broadband internet access on economic development in Tribal communities and the relationship between partisanship and voting behavior. His work has been published in the Southern Economic Journal and The Economists' Voice.

Sharma earned his Ph.D. in economics from George Mason University, where he focused on applied microeconomics. His teaching experience includes intermediate macroeconomics, econometrics, and economics for public policy.

Marketing, Management and Supply Chain

Mareé Nuñez

Assistant Professor of Practice, Marketing, Management, and Supply Chain

Mareé Nuñez returns to UTEP with an industry career built around the movement of goods — from transportation and warehousing to logistics networks and supply chain strategy.

Her professional experience includes leading transportation operations, managing complex logistics networks, developing carrier partnerships, and working in negotiation and process improvement. That experience gives her classroom teaching a strong connection to the operational decisions companies make every day.

A UTEP alumna, Nuñez earned both her Bachelor of Business Administration and Master of Business Administration from the University. Her move into the classroom brings that education full circle, pairing her academic foundation with the industry experience she developed after graduation.

Marketing, Management and Supply Chain

Karla Dryden

Assistant Professor of Practice, Marketing, Management and Supply Chain

Cross-border business has been a practical part of Karla Dryden's career. Having lived and worked on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border, she has worked across international trade, project management, technology implementation, business process improvement, and public-sector operations.

Her experience includes leading initiatives supporting cross-border mobility and operations at one of North America's busiest international ports of entry, requiring coordination among government agencies, private industry, and community stakeholders. That background gives her a distinctly regional perspective on international business and supply chain issues.

Dryden is also a UTEP alumna, earning two bachelor's degrees and an MBA from the University, and is a certified Project Management Professional. She now brings that combination of academic training and binational professional experience back to Hunt College.

Welcome to Hunt College

New expertise, connected to a changing business world.

Together, the college's newest faculty add depth across technology, markets, policy, operations, and the cross-border economy — perspectives that will shape both research and the student experience in the year ahead.