Professor Anna-Lena Sachs
Professor in Predictive AnalyticsCareer Details
Anna-Lena Sachs is a Professor in Predictive Analytics at Lancaster University. Her research focuses on inventory management including the intersection to forecasting and behavioural operations management. With her research, she has informed the practices at organisations in different areas such as retailing, transportation, health care, sports and others.
She develops quantitative models to support decision makers. In field experiments and conducts laboratory she analyses what type of decision support is useful in practice and how human decision makers actually behave.
Research Interests
Anna-Lena’s research interests are in the areas of optimisation, in particular, inventory management, as well as behavioural operations management and the intersection to forecasting. She has developed new data-driven methods to solve problems of high academic and practical relevance.
She has led and supervised many supply chain-related projects with industrial partners from retailing, automotive, manufacturing, mail services, pharma, FMCG, healthcare, transportation, sports and many more.
Her research is driven by the motivation to use data to solve problems of high practical relevance that have not been solved before. She analyses large datasets from industry and develops novel, quantitative approaches to solve these problems.
Her current research focuses on:
- Inventory management
- Decision-support for managers
- Assigning workers to workstations
- Dynamic pricing
- Reinforcement learning
- Maintenance and inventory decisions
- Demand forecasting
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STOR-i : Simulation-optimisation for football
01/06/2026 → 30/09/2029
Research
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STOR-i: Multi-echelon inventory optimisation - Nikki Peddinenikalva
01/10/2025 → 30/09/2028
Research
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STORi Clustering and changepoint detection to identify suitable demand forecasting algorithms in the automotive industry
01/10/2025 → 30/09/2028
Research
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STOR-i: Inventory management for preventive and corrective maintenance under supply chain risks - Joe Rutherford
01/10/2024 → 30/09/2027
Research
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STOR-i: Inventory management for preventive and corrective maintenance under supply chain risks - Joe Rutherford
01/10/2024 → 30/09/2027
Research
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STOR-i: Multi-echelon inventory optimisation
01/10/2024 → 30/09/2028
Research
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KTP with Jaguar Land Rover Ltd (extension)
18/04/2024 → 17/06/2024
Research
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STORi: DSI: Safety in reinforcement learning decision making (Adam Page)
01/01/2023 → 30/09/2026
Research
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STORI: End of life planning for mobile phones - Ben Lowry
01/10/2022 → 30/09/2025
Research
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KTP with Jaguar Land Rover Ltd
01/05/2022 → 30/04/2024
Research
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DSI : STOR-i - Reducing Obsolescence Waste at Jaguar Land Rover by Better Forecasting and Inventory Management - Robyn Goldsmith
01/10/2021 → 31/03/2025
Research
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STORi: Resource allocation under uncertain demand in Royal Mail Mail Centres
01/10/2020 → 30/09/2023
Research
5th IMA and OR Society Conference on Mathematics of Operational Research
Participation in conference - Academic
INFORMS Annual Meeting
Participation in conference - Academic
66th Annual Conference of the Operational Research Society
Participation in conference - Academic
External Examiner for PhD
Examination
IMA Journal of Management Mathematics (Journal)
Editorial activity
International Journal of Production Research (Journal)
Editorial activity
Consultant - GlaxoSmithKline Project
Consultancy
Dean’s Award for Academic Excellence
Prize (including medals and awards)
Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, ATLAS
Fellowship awarded competitively
Research impact award for the Centre for Marketing Analytics and Forecasting
Prize (including medals and awards)
Centre for Marketing Analytics & Forecasting, STOR-i Centre for Doctoral Training
Centre for Marketing Analytics & Forecasting
Centre for Marketing Analytics & Forecasting, Statistical Artificial Intelligence, STOR-i Centre for Doctoral Training
Centre for Marketing Analytics & Forecasting, STOR-i Centre for Doctoral Training
Centre for Marketing Analytics & Forecasting, Simulation and Stochastic Modelling, STOR-i Centre for Doctoral Training
- Centre for Marketing Analytics & Forecasting
- DSAIL - Foundations
- Optimisation
- STOR-i Centre for Doctoral Training