Professor Özlem Bedre-Defolie (ESMT Berlin) and Professor Fabrizia Mealli (University of Florence) will take up full-time positions at the EUI's Economics Department in September 2023.
Özlem Bedre-Defolie is Associate Professor of Economics at ESMT Berlin since 2017, where she holds a tenured post. She is also a CEPR Research Fellow since December 2020 and a MaCCI Research Fellow since January 2022.
In addition, she serves as Associate Professor II (part-time position) at the University of Bergen and Bergen Center for Competition Law and Economics (BECCLE) since August 2021. She is an Associate Editor at the RAND Journal of Economics since September 2020 and a Director at the European Association for Research in Industrial Economics since October 2020.
Her research areas are applied microeconomic theory and industrial organisation, with a focus on antitrust and regulation questions related to economics of multi-sided platforms, multiproduct firms, and vertical contracts.
Bedre-Defolie has been awarded the European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant (2020-2025). She has taught various courses to MBA and Master's in Management students, as well as courses in the PhD programme of the Berlin School of Economics.
"I am honoured and very happy to join the EUI as a full Professor holding a Joint Chair in Microeconomics at the Robert Schuman Centre and the Department of Economics," shared Bedre-Defolie in reacting to her appointment. "This prestigious position will enable me to further pursue my research in applied microeconomics and benefit from an enriching research environment and interactions with top-notch colleagues, great-quality researchers, and PhD students. The Robert Schuman Centre will provide me with inter-dısciplinary interactions to advance policy-relevant research in the field of Digital Markets. I very much look forward to contributing to the research and education at the EUI," she added.
Fabrizia Mealli is Professor of Statistics at the Department of Statistics, Informatics, Applications "G.Parenti" - DiSIA at the University of Florence since 2005 and Director of the Florence Center for Data Science.
Since 2021, she has been a Part-time Professor at the EUI's Department of Economics. She held visiting positions at the Harvard Statistics and Biostatistics Departments in 2001, 2015, and 2017.
Her research focuses on statistical and econometric methods for causal inference in experimental and observational settings, estimation techniques, simulation methods, missing data, and Bayesian inference, with applications to the social and biomedical sciences.
Mealli is an Elected Fellow of the American Statistical Association (ASA) and sits on the Steering Committee of the European Causal Inference Meeting (EUROCIM). She is an Associate Editor for the Journal of the American Statistical Association T&M, The Annals of Applied Statistics, and Observational Studies. Since 2001, Mealli has been teaching Causal Inference in International Schools and in Master and PhD programmes around the world.
"I am thrilled to begin this new chapter in my career. The EUI is renowned for its commitment to excellence in research and teaching, and I am eager to contribute to its mission. I will have the opportunity to work with talented students and colleagues, engage in cutting-edge research, and make a meaningful impact in my field," shared Mealli.