Karthik Krishnan

Welcome to my professional website. I am an Associate Professor of Finance at Northeastern University’s D’Amore- McKim School of Business. For academic collaboration, research discussions, or to explore potential projects within your organization, please use the contact information below.

Academic Research and Applied Technology Experience

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Background

With 25+ years in machine learning and a foundation in academic research, I bridge theoretical knowledge and practical applications across various domains. My work encompasses both modern AI technologies and established ML methodologies.

Academic Research

My research focuses on Corporate Finance, Household Finance, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship. View my academic publications here.

Teaching

I have taught courses in Corporate Finance, Venture Capital and Startup Funding, Financial Management. For the past 4 years, I have taught an Applied Machine Learning Course in Finance.

Industry Experience

I co-founded and led a Fintech organization for over 6 years that deployed more than $20 million in workforce development financing. This experience encompassed:

• Operations in regulatory environments
• Capital structure development
• Technology implementation and data analytics approaches in financial services

During this time, our organization received certification as a Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) from the U.S. Treasury Department.

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Technical Background

AI & Machine Learning

• Large Language Models – OpenAI, Claude, open-source implementations in Hugging Face
• Model Context Protocol (MCP) integration
• Agent-based task automation systems and conversational models
• Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) and Vector-Based search
• Reinforcement learning approaches – Contextual Multi-Armed Bandits, epsilot greedy and Thompson Sampling approaches

Machine Learning Methodologies

• Statistical modeling
• Deep learning and ensemble methods (Random Forest, Neural Networks, Boosting)
• Data synthesis techniques
• Analytics frameworks

Development Experience

• Python
• Containerized development environments and Docker
• CI/CD and Github Actions
• Database architecture – PostgreSQL
• Cloud infrastructure – Google Cloud
• Web development fundamentals – Jira
• Front-end development – React, HTML/CSS

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Collaborative Projects

I have collaborated with organizations in education and healthcare sectors (including an SBIR Phase 2 recipient) on projects involving:

• Analytics framework development
• Synthetic training data generation
• Data model design
• Systems optimization through data-driven approaches