Doctoral student accepts tenure-track faculty position at Bentley University

Chenguang Shang, a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Business Administration at Wayne State University, has accepted a position as an assistant professor in the Department of Finance at Bentley University, beginning in fall 2014.

Prior to attending WSU, Shang earned a B.A. in accounting at Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics in China and an M.S. in finance at Temple University in Philadelphia. Before leaving for the U.S., he interned at Beijing Huayuanxingye Investment Co., Ltd.

Deciding on a career in academia, Shang applied to WSU’s Ph.D. program in finance based on several factors.

"The finance faculty here at Wayne State are very well established and their research was in line with my area of interest, particularly that of Professors Datta and Iskandar-Datta. Plus, the university offered a diverse environment in which to study," he said.

Since his arrival at WSU, Shang has received several honors for his teaching and scholarship. He’s earned both the School of Business Administration’s Student Teaching Award as well as the university’s Thomas C. Rumble University Graduate Fellowship.

Shang’s dissertation, titled "Deal Innovations in Mergers and Acquisitions: Do Go Shop Provisions Create Real Benefits?" examines the effect of the provision that allows companies being sold to solicit other offers even after they have reached initial deals with the original bidders. Shang concludes that the provision, an increasingly popular strategy in financial transactions, is indeed an effective market check tool for the seller. Shang is scheduled to defend his dissertation and receive his doctoral degree in May.

Located just west of Boston in Waltham, Massachusetts, Bentley University is a top-rated educational institution. U.S. News and World Report ranked Bentley fourth in the North Region in its 2014 “Best Regional Universities,” while Bloomberg Business Week’s 2013 issue of "The Best Undergraduate Business Schools," listed Bentley at number 20 among undergraduate business programs in the nation. Princeton Review, Forbes, Parade Magazine and the 2014 Fiske Guide also cite the institution for its research and teaching quality.

Shang’s appointment has special meaning to his dissertation committee chair, Sudip Datta, who spent 15 years on the faculty at Bentley before he was recruited to Wayne State.

"It was a tough fight and Chenguang beat out more than 220 candidates from top Ph.D. programs to get this appointment," said Datta, who also serves as the chair of WSU’s Department of Finance.

"Our finance doctoral graduate placement record has been excellent, especially given that we have a relatively new program," he continued. "We placed all three doctoral students from our first cohort and, as members of this May’s graduating class and our second cohort, Chenguang and fellow doctoral candidate, Matthew Ross, have each accepted tremendous offers prior to graduation."