Dr. Milena Petrova’s areas of specialization are in real estate finance, corporate governance, merger and acquisition analysis, corporate / equity valuation and corporate financial strategy. Dr. Petrova’s unique experience in both industry and academia allows her to combine theory with practice in her work for industry clients.
Dr. Petrova is Assistant Professor of Finance at the Whitman School of Management, Syracuse University, USA. She has a Master’s Degree in Business Administration with a concentration in International Business from the Helsinki School of Economics, Finland, a Master’s Degree in Finance from Hofstra University, USA and a Ph.D. in Finance, with a focus on Real Estate Finance from the University of Florida, USA. She has published in Real Estate Economics, Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, and the Journal of Applied Finance. She was awarded the CoStar 2007 Award for best paper using commercial real estate data and the Gerald R. Brown 2003 Award for best paper on “Real Estate and Finance” from the Asian Real Estate Society. Dr. Petrova has had papers accepted for presentation at the Financial Management Association, Southern Finance Association, European Finance Association, American Real Estate Society, European Real Estate Society, Asian Real Estate Society, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, and the Maastricht-MIT-Cambridge Real Estate Finance and Investment Symposium. Dr. Petrova has trained and consulted for real estate and investment professionals in Europe, USA, Asia and Africa.
Prior to taking an academic position, Dr. Petrova worked as a consultant for Booz Allen Hamilton and as a project finance analyst for Finnvera, Finland’s official Export Credit Agency. Some of her projects for clients included financial analysis and analysis of business models; business plan evaluation; corporate restructuring and identification of exit opportunities; organizational restructuring; merger analysis; and strategic analysis in a post-merger integration. In project finance she was involved with setting up a venture capital program for start-up enterprises and establishing an umbrella guarantee financing program for SMEs.
