Title: Dynamic Pricing and Product Quality with Review-Driven Learning

Speaker: Sandun Perera, Professor of the University of Nevada, Reno

Time: Friday, December 26, 2025, 10:00 AM

Venue: Room A1028, New Main Building, Xueyuan Road Campus

Organizer: School of Economics and Management

Abstract:

Online product reviews play a pivotal role in empowering consumers by reducing uncertainty about product attributes, a phenomenon widely studied from the demand perspective. However, the supply-side implications remain less understood-particularly how firms can leverage consumer reviews to develop an integrated pricing-quality strategy. To address this gap, we examine a firm's dynamic pricing and product-quality decisions over two selling periods, where consumer reviews play a central role in shaping the market's perception of a new experience good. Both the firm and its consumers are initially uncertain about the product's perceived (market based) quality and rely on early reviews to update their beliefs. Our analysis identifies two critical review metrics—volume and valence—as jointly shaping the firm's optimal strategy.

About the Speaker:

Sandun Perera is a Professor of Business Analytics and Operations in the College of Business at the University of Nevada, Reno. His research spans Supply Chain Management, Disruptive Technologies in Operations Management, Healthcare Operations Management, and the interfaces between Operations and other functional business areas. He serves as a Senior Editor for Production and Operations Management, Department Editor for IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, and Associate Editor for OMEGA, Decision Sciences, and Transportation Research Part E.

Editor: Liu Tingting