Fabian Akkerman wins prestigious 2026 EURO Doctoral Dissertation Award

Fabian Akkerman (Faculty of Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences, BMS) has won the prestigious 2026 EURO Doctoral Dissertation Award. During the 24th Conference of the International Federation of Operational Research Societies (IFORS), recently held in Vienna, Austria, he presented his doctoral dissertation, Machine Learning for Sequential Decisions in Logistics.

The EURO Doctoral Dissertation Award recognises outstanding contributions to the field of Operations Research by PhD graduates and researchers with less than two years of postdoctoral research experience. Since 2015, no Dutch researcher had reached the final of this prestigious competition. This year, however, two Dutch researchers were selected as finalists: Bart van Rossum (Erasmus University Rotterdam) and Fabian Akkerman from the University of Twente. Akkerman was ultimately selected by the jury as the winner of the award.

Dissertation

Akkerman's dissertation investigates how machine learning (ML) can strengthen sequential decision-making in logistics under uncertainty, complementing traditional operations research methods. Through collaborations with industry partners, the research addresses challenges in inbound logistics (inventory management and dual sourcing), distribution logistics (vehicle routing and last-mile delivery), and revenue management (parcel locker deliveries and delivery time-slot pricing).

The dissertation distinguishes between data analytics (prediction) and decision analytics (learning decision rules) and proposes a framework for integrating machine learning into logistics operations based on this distinction.

Industrial Engineering and Management Science

Akkerman is an Assistant Professor in the Industrial Engineering and Management Science group at the University of Twente. He obtained his PhD cum laude in 2025 under the supervision of Martijn Mes, Maria Iacob, and Willem van Jaarsveld, after completing his MSc in Industrial Engineering and Management in 2021. From September to December 2024, he was a visiting researcher at Polytechnique Montréal under the supervision of Thibaut Vidal.

Machine learning

Akkerman's research focuses on machine learning at the intersection of decision-making and interpretable artificial intelligence.

"In my applied research, I use reinforcement learning and related methods to support sequential decision-making under uncertainty in transportation and logistics. This includes dynamic vehicle routing, delivery time-slot selection, pricing, and other resource allocation problems. In my more fundamental research, I develop mathematically grounded methods for interpretable AI, with a focus on improving both accuracy and scalability."

Akkerman's PhD research received the INFORMS TSL Society Dissertation Award in 2025 and the EURO Doctoral Dissertation Award in 2026. The DynaPlex project, which includes his doctoral research and industry collaborations, received the TKI Dinalog Impact Award in 2025. From September 2020 to March 2021, he completed an internship at ORTEC, where he conducted research on revenue management for home delivery services. His work has also been featured in the media, including on NPO Radio 1.

dr.ir. F.R. Akkerman (Fabian) Assistant Professor

+31534896891

 f.r.akkerman@utwente.nl

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