2020 IAAA Finalists Announced

Kinaxis, Adelphi University and the Analytics Society of INFORMS, sponsors of the Innovative Applications in Analytics Award (IAAA), announced six finalists for the 2020 competition. The purpose of the award is to recognize creative and unique application of a combination of analytical techniques in new areas. The prize promotes the awareness and value of the creative combination of analytics techniques in unusual applications to provide insights and business value. The truly multi-national slate of finalist teams will compete in the final round of the competition on April 28 in Denver during the 2020 INFORMS Business Analytics Conference. Winners will be announced at an awards luncheon that day.

According to IAAA co-chairs Pallav Chhaochhria, director of algorithmic trading, Citi, and Juan Jaramillo, associate professor of decision sciences, Adelphi University, the judging panel faced a difficult challenge in selecting finalists from among a large number of quality submissions. Finalist projects and authors of this year’s competition, in no particular order, include:

“Timing it Right: Development and Implementation of a Discharge Decision Tool for Readmission Reduction”

Jonathan E. Helm, Indiana University; Pengyi Shi, Purdue University; Julian Pan and Jivan Deglise-Hawkinson, Lean Care Solutions, Pte. Ltd. 

“Cognitive B2B Pricing Analytics Platform”

Zhengliang Xue, Huijing Jiang, Naoki Abe and Markus Ettl, IBM T.J. Watson Research Center; Donald Keefer, Liyang Song, Elizabeth Bourgoin, IBM Chief Analytics Office 

“Open Grid Europe”

Janina Zittel and Milena Petkovic, Zuse Institute of Berlin; Dr. Thorsten Koch, Kai Hoppmann, Technische Universität Berlin, Zuse Institute Berlin; Felix Hennings, Technische Universität Berlin; Frank Klimek, Mladen Terzic, Julian Steinmeyer, Klaus Spreckelsen, Dr. Uwe Gotzes, Open Grid Europe GmbH; Dr. Steffen Weider, Christof Schulz, LBW Optimization GmbH; and all other members of the Research Campus MODAL GasLab

“Integrated Analytics for Sustainable Agriculture in Latin America”

Ricardo Curiel, International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT)

“Detecting Customer Trends from Transaction Data for Optimal Promotion Targeting in Retail”

Kiran Panchamgam and Setareh Borjian-Boroujeni, Oracle; Lennart Baardman, University of Michigan; Tamar Cohen-Hillel and Georgia Perakis, MIT 

“The Driver Guidance System for Taxi Drivers”

Shih-Fen Cheng, Rishikeshan Rajendram, Meghna Lowalekar and Pradeep Varakantham, Singapore Management University; Shashi Shekhar Jha, Indian Institute of Technology Ropar; Prabod Rathnayaka, La Trobe University