Prof. Andreas Holzapfel, Professor for Logistics Management at Hochschule Geisenheim University, has been awarded the Science Prize 2019 in the category "Cooperation". The prize, worth €20,000 awarded by the EHI Foundation and GS1 Germany, is seen as the most prestigious prize for trade research in a German-speaking country. The jury honored Prof. Holzapfel's research project dealing with improving inventory accuracy in the retail trade, which he carried out together with dm-drogerie markt GmbH + Co. KG and its Branch Logistics Manager and Geisenheim adjunct lecturer, Dr. Michael Sternbeck as well as Prof. Heinrich Kuhn from the Katholischen Universität Eichstätt-Ingolstadt.
Specifically the project partners addressed the problem of inventory discrepancies. Automized ordering systems are an integral part of omni-channel trade - when a company sells in both a store and online - and operate as part of the company's IT-system-stored inventory data. There can currently be numerous discrepancies, which can at worst lead to loss of turnover. This was the starting point of the research project in which Geisenheim was involved: the scientists developed algorithms to identify quantity discrepancies between actual stock at the point of sale and the stock according to the system. This provides the basis for a focused stock check and the detection of error sources in logistics processes. They also enable error correction in the store systems and ensure that the quality of automatic repeat orders increases.
The award-winning project is the most comprehensive data-based study of retail inventory accuracy to date, and provides differentiated results for different product groups. "The methods developed by us provide specific information, based on the system and sales data, as to which products should be counted separately outside the regular inventory, and when this should be done. All tests carried out so far are very positive and show that, with minimal effort, the inventory accuracy in retail operations can be improved significantly. Improvement measures can be far more focused than before", explained Prof. Holzapfel.
"This year's award winners have demonstrated the important ideas that come from research and how they fuel the innovative power of business practice", further emphasized EHI President, Kurt Jox. The EHI Foundation, founded in 2013 by EHI Retail Institute e. V., promotes interaction between science and trade, motivating universities to conduct trade-related research. GS1 Germany supports companies in the implementation of modern communications and process standards. Among other things, the company is responsible for the worldwide overlap-free GS1 article number system - the basis of the barcode..
