Professor Philip Zhang Renyu named RGC Research Fellow
Professor Philip Zhang Renyu, Associate Professor in the Department of Decisions, Operations and Technology at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) Business School, has been awarded the Research Grants Council (RGC) Research Fellow Scheme (RFS) 2025/26, in recognition of his outstanding research achievements.
Professor Zhang’s award-winning project, titled “AI-powered Data-driven Decision Making in Business”, seeks to bridge the gap between state-of-the-art AI technologies and their adoption in business research. By using large language models (LLMs) to build AI agents that can simulate human decision making in business, the study aims to predict human responses to certain policy interventions accurately. By integrating AI into causal inference frameworks, personalised treatment effect estimations can lead to more precise policy evaluations and efficient optimisation for the policy of interest.
Furthermore, the research delves into the economic and societal impacts of generative AI in business contexts, focusing on areas like algorithmic fairness and data privacy. Collaborating with industry partners and implementing the research in practice, this project seeks to enhance our understanding of AI-driven business decision-making, aligning with Hong Kong’s strategic focus on AI and data science development.
This year, 11 scholars across Hong Kong were named RGC Research Fellows. Each award includes funding of over HK$5 million in a 60-month period. The RGC Research Fellow Scheme aims to provide sustained research support integrated with relief from teaching and administrative duties for outstanding researchers at Associate Professor rank at UGC-funded universities in Hong Kong, with a view to facilitating academics to dedicate their career to research and development as well as to give them the time and resources to nurture and train the next generation of local research talent for Hong Kong.