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Alex Tschan
Alex Tschan

Alex Tschan

Research and development manager
ALDI SÜD Germany
Bio

Alex Tschan is the research and development manager in the national buying and purchasing committee at ALDI SÜD Germany. He is a trained industrial engineer and pursuing a PhD at the Technical University of Munich, focusing on supply chain management in the retail sector. His research involves the application of machine learning and optimization in real-world business environments. As a creator of various operational software tools for ALDI, he significantly improves the company’s performance. His team was a finalist at the INFORMS Franz Edelman Award 2024


Reinforcement Learning for Procurement Decisions: Integrating Stochastic Demand Modeling and Expert Feedback

The talk “Reinforcement Learning for Procurement Decisions: Integrating Stochastic Demand Modeling and Expert Feedback” explores procurement strategies across two distinct business domains: a German discount retailer and a Swiss supplier of spare parts for agricultural and construction machinery. These companies operate under unique market dynamics, requiring tailored purchasing strategies and analytical approaches. Despite the availability of numerous off-the-shelf software solutions, they have developed proprietary software that leverages machine learning and expert knowledge to maintain a competitive edge. This presentation will detail the integration of reinforcement learning techniques with stochastic demand models, demonstrating how real-world expert feedback enhances model accuracy and decision-making efficiency in non-stationary procurement environments. 

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