PREDICTIVE BUSINESS ANALYTICS FORECASTING & PLANNING CONFERENCE

Event Speakers

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Ted Hanawalt

General Motors

Director, Global Long Term Forecasting and Industry Analysis

Ted Hanawalt is the Director of Global Forecasting and Market Analysis at General Motors, responsible for synthesizing market data into strategic issues and actionable opportunities. Ted’s experience at General Motors covers a variety of different functions, particularly from a product demand forecasting, product portfolio strategy, and manufacturing strategy perspective. Ted holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineering and an M.S. in Manufacturing Engineering from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and an MBA from Pennsylvania State University.

Arya Eskamani

Restaurant Services Inc.

Senior Analyst, Predictive Analytics

Arya Eskamani currently holds the role of Senior Predictive Analytics Analyst for Restaurant Services, Inc. where he is responsible for all complex analytical and forecasting projects. He has over five years of experience applying predictive analytics in a variety of professional fields including technology, healthcare, and manufacturing. Arya received his Bachelors in Business Economics from the University of Central Florida and a M.S. in Economics from Florida Atlantic University.

Chad Shumacher

Kellogg’s

Sr. Director, Global Analytics

Chad is an experienced analytics and programming expert, with extensive exposure to a variety of roles in analytics, Supply Chain, and Planning. With an academic background in Finance and Statistics, Chad’s career includes management roles in application development, leading a team of developers at Dlt Database Designs. It was here that he project-managed the creation and deployment of a variety of applications to support Finance, Sales and Operations, and Demand Forecasting functions. This experience led him to an analytics role at Kellogg in 2005, assuming the position of Sales Modeling & Analytics Manager. He has worked at Kellogg ever since, moving on to Director of Sales & Modeling, then Principal Data Scientist and then on to his current role as Sr. Director of Global Analytics. Chad holds a degree in Finance and Statistics from Western Michigan University. He was a special guest speaker at IBF’s “Predictive Business Analytics & Forecasting Conference in New Orleans. Hear Predictive Analytics & Forecasting thought leaders speak at IBF's next conference in New Orleans, May 6-8, 2019. See here for details: https://ibf.org/events/neworleans2019

Sylvia Starnes, CPF

Continental Tire

Demand Collaboration Manager

Sylvia Starnes serves as the Senior Demand Collaboration Manager at Continental Tire. She holds a B.A. in Business Administration from Monlieat College and is certified in Production and Inventory Management (CPIM) and Certificated Supply Chain Profession (CSCP) by APICS, and is an IBF Certified Professional Forecaster (CPF). Sylvia has 20 years of experience with Supply Chain and CPFR.

Sara Brumbaugh

Ceres Analytics

Managing Principal

Sara Brumbaugh is Managing Principal of Ceres Analytics, a consultancy specializing in applied mathematics, statistics, and machine learning. Sara's roots are in business forecasting: she's worked with the IBF for 20 years, and is the 2015 recipient of IBF’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Sara’s work in predictive analytics began with construction of forecast drivers to predict stock returns. Her current analytic work supports genetic brain research at Harvard Medical School. Other recent work includes patent-pending algorithms to detect financial fraud, and genetic models to predict success of cancer chemotherapy. Sara holds a masters in Economics from Florida State University.

Ryan Chan

Solution Design

Director

Ryan Chan is the Senior Director of Solution Design at LLamasoft. The Solution Design team’s key responsibilities include the presentation of technology solutions based on customer requirements, creation of proof of concepts, educating potential and existing customers on industry best practices and quantifying potential benefits derived from the application of LLamasoft technologies. Prior his role in Solution Design, Ryan served as the Product Manager of Supply Chain Guru as well as a Senior Consultant. Ryan also has experience designing supply chains for a major retailer as well as a multi-national manufacturing company. He received his BS in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Purdue University and his MBA from Krannert School of Management at Purdue University.

Charles W. Chase, Jr., CPF

SAS Institute, Inc.

Advisory Industry Consultant

Mr. Chase is an author, thought leader and trusted advisor delivering demand planning and forecasting solutions to improve consumer packaged goods companies supply chain efficiencies. Prior to that, he worked for various companies, including the Mennen Company, Johnson & Johnson, Consumer Products Inc., Reckitt Benckiser PLC, Polaroid Corporation, Coca Cola, Wyeth-Ayerst Pharmaceuticals, and Heineken USA. He has more than 20 years of experience in the consumer packaged goods industry, and is an expert in sales forecasting, market response modeling, econometrics, and supply chain management. He is the author of several books, including Next Generation Demand Management: People, Process, Analytics, and Technology and Demand-Driven Forecasting: A Structured Approach to Forecasting. In addition, he is co-author of Bricks Matter: The Role of Supply Chains in Building Market-Driven Differentiation. He is also the second recipient of the IBF Lifetime Achievement Award.

Mary Côté

MAXIMUS Canada

Director, Product Development

Tom Dyer

Collaborative Outcomes

President

Tom Dyer is president of the coaching and consulting firm Collaborative Outcomes, which assists in clarifying the results that teams want to achieve, and the roles they need to assume in order to make them a reality. For 23 years, Tom has assisted teams in achieving strategic and operational goals through greater collaboration, corporate retreats, consultancy services, leadership programs and skills development. He has worked with leaders in large organizations across the globe including Sanofi, Novo Nordisk, Merck and Boehringer-Ingelheim. A psychologist by training, Tom is a practitioner of Neuro-linguistic Programming and holds a degree in Marketing and a Doctorate in Spiritual Science.

Michael Gilliland

SAS Institute

Product Marketing Manager

Michael Gilliland is author of The Business Forecasting Deal, and currently Product Marketing Manager for SAS forecasting software. He worked in consumer products forecasting for over fifteen years in the food, electronics, and apparel industries, and as a consultant. Mike holds a BA in Philosophy from Michigan State University, and Master's degrees in Philosophy and Mathematical Sciences from Johns Hopkins University. He has published in Journal of Business Forecasting, Supply Chain Management Review, Foresight: The International Journal of Applied Forecasting, Analytics, and APICS Magazine, and wrote a quarterly column on "Worst Practices" for Supply Chain Forecasting Digest.

Rhonda Harp

Merck & Co., Inc.

Director, Global Commercial Forecasting

Rhonda Harp is currently the Director of Global Commercial Forecasting (GCF) for the Hospital, Specialty and Primary Care business line at Merck. She is responsible for leading a team of forecasters, focusing on influencing major investment decisions and shaping strategy for products from launch onward. In her 19 years at Merck, Rhonda has spent the majority of her time focused on forecasting with experience across all stages of the product life cycle from development through patent expiry. Rhonda has an MBA from DeSales University and BSBA from Gwynedd-Mercy University.

Fred Hefer

Pomerol Partners

CEO

Fred is the US and global CEO of Pomerol Partners, a 2013 spin-out from Deutsche Bank (London) and Qlik analytics services provider and developer of Blockchain solutions. During his tenure at DB, Fred served the Equities Prime Services division in various finance roles from analyst to controller to manager, with a specialization in Securities Lending. Before this, he spent time at Royal Bank of Scotland working in Business Analysis and Business Intelligence roles. Fred serves on the Qlik Americas Partner Advisory Council and was recently recognized as a 2017 Qlik Luminary. He holds a degree in Economics and Business Management from Stellenbosch University in South Africa.

Jonathon Karelse

Factors Group of Nutritional Companies

Chief Strategy Officer

Jonathon’s professional career has consisted of leadership roles in Transportation, Finance and Health Products; beginning in Supply Chain and Demand Planning roles and culminating in VP – Strategic Planning and Corporate Development. Currently, he functions as that Chief Strategy Officer at the Factors Group of Nutritional Companies. He is a recognized thought leader in Demand Planning and is Co-founding partner of the S&OP consultancy NorthFind partners. Jonathon has been a long-term contributor to the IBF’s body of knowledge, with specific focus on forecasting metrics and diagnostics, and Forecast Value Add. He studied Economics at the University of Western Ontario before moving to Vancouver to study Law at the University of British Columbia. Thereafter, Jonathon studied Operations and Value Chain Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Michael Lavaglio

Dexcom

Director, Supply Chain Planning

Mike is the Director of Supply Planning at Dexcom, a medical device manufacturer based in San Diego, whose main product is a continuous glucose monitor to help with diabetes care. He is responsible for leading the S&OP process, Master Production Scheduling, and MRP system implementation. Prior to Dexcom, Mike spent 3 years at Stone Brewing Company managing their S&OP process and leading the Supply Chain department, including the Planning, Procurement, and Warehousing functions. Other career highlights include a couple of years at a medical device start-up and 7 years at Abbott Laboratories (formally Guidant) in various Supply Chain and supplier quality functions. Mike graduated with a degree in Biochemistry from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, and holds APICS, CPSC, and Six Sigma Green Belt certifications.

Brian Lewis

Vanguard Software

Executive Vice President

Brian is EVP at Vanguard Software, which delivers advanced-analytic forecasting and optimization capabilities worldwide through a single, cloud platform for IBP, S&OP, Supply Chain, and Finance. Brian has more than 10 years of experience in Business Forecasting and Planning, Supply Chain Management, and advanced analytics. He previously held positions at Ford Motor Company, UPS, and Providian Financial. Brian has a Ph.D. in Operations Research and Supply Chain Analytics from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Luidi Maia

OneSubsea

General Manager for Landing Strings Services in North America and Caribbean

Luidi has 13 years’ experience spread across Procurement and Demand & Supply Planning. He started his career at Johnson & Johnson as a Procurement Analyst for non-stock products and services but has spent most of his career in the Oil & Gas Industry with Schlumberger. He is now General Manager for one of its subsidiaries, OneSubsea. He has worked on numerous transformational projects at Schlumberger and occupied various roles, including Head of Supply Planning for the Western hemisphere. Key successes include implementing Regional Distribution Centers and Regional Supply Planning processes and systems. Luidi holds a BSc in Electrical Engineering and an MBA from INSEAD.

Alan L. Milliken CPF

BASF Group

Senior Manager – Supply Chain Capability Development

Alan Milliken is a Senior Manager assigned to the Supply Chain Capability Development Team at BASF, the world’s leading chemical company. He has 40 years of experience in Supply Chain and Operations Management including 22 years at major manufacturing sites, 14 years as a business process & Supply Chain consultant and 6 years as a full-time educator. He is a frequent speaker at Supply Chain conferences and has been published many times. Alan has participated first-hand in demand planning implementations as both a practitioner and consultant and, as subject matter expert, created the demand planning education course at BASF. He is an IBF Certified Professional Forecaster (CPF) and a member of IBF’s Board of Advisors.

Vikram Srinivasan

LLamasoft

Product Group Manager Data & Analytics

Vikram Srinivasan is Product Group Manager for Data & Analytics LLamasoft and is primarily responsible for managing the data analytics and demand modeling product offerings and defining and prioritizing market requirements. Vikram’s expertise spans network and inventory optimization and demand modeling. Prior to his Product Management role, Vikram worked as a Senior Consultant at LLamasoft on multiple projects solving various supply chain design problems. He received his M.S in Industrial Engineering (Major: Operations Research) at The Ohio State University.

Jon Weininger

Georgia-Pacific Gypsum

Former S&OP Manager – Demand Planning

As S&OP Manager - Demand Planning for Georgia-Pacific Gypsum, Jon is responsible for implementing best practices in the company's demand forecasting process. In this role, he championed the use of the statistical forecast to serve as the baseline for the company's S&OP consensus building process and launched an initiative to track and report forecast accuracy. Prior to joining Georgia-Pacific Gypsum, Jon spent four years at Home Depot, starting in Store Operations before moving to the Supply Chain Analytics group. As part of that team, he participated in Supply Chain Sync, one of the biggest Supply Chain transformation projects ever undertaken and part of Home Depot's $1.8 billion investment in technology. Here he learned about inventory management, forecasting, distribution center operations and end-to-end Supply Chain initiatives.

Eric Wilson, CPF

Escalade Sports

Director of Planning

Eric is a predictive analytics and business planning innovator, author, and speaker. He is the Director of Demand Planning at Escalade Sports. Prior to this he worked as the Director of Demand Planning at Berry Plastics, and Director of Demand Planning & S&OP at Tempur Sealy International. In 2016, he received the Excellence in Business Forecasting & Planning award from the IBF. He is a Certified Professional Forecaster (CPF) with over 20 years experience. Eric is a visionary in his field, a frequent speaker and panelist for many executive forums and professional conferences, and has written numerous articles in publications such as The Journal of Business Forecasting and APICS Magazine. He is also the author of the book Cultural Cycles.

Yi Xiao

Alvarez & Marsal

Senior Director

Yi Xiao is a Senior Director at Alvarez & Marsal, a global consulting from that links Operations, performance improvement, and value creation to help companies turn areas of stagnation into growth. Xi had helped multiple Global 1000 companies with Supply Chain strategy and performance improvement by leveraging Big Data and analytics. Before joining Alvarez and Marsal, Xi worked in various Supply Chain leadership roles at Halliburton. He holds an MBA from the University of Texas at Austin where he served as the Chair of the McCombs Admissions Committee. He also holds a Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Houston and is APICS certified in Production and Inventory.

Randy Wilp

Merck & Co., Inc.

Executive Director, Global Commercial Forecasting CoE (GCF)

Randy Wilp is currently Executive Director, Global Commercial Forecasting (GCF) at Merck. GCF is responsible for influencing major investment decisions, during product launch and through its remaining lifecycle. During his 30-year career Randy has held various forecasting related positions, including a stint as Director of Predictive Analytics at Bristol Myers Squibb and Director of Global Strategic Forecasting at Pharmacia. He has also run his own forecast consulting firm and lead the forecast consulting practice within a consulting company. Randy is currently on IBF’s Board of Advisors and holds three separate degrees from the University of Missouri-Saint Louis.

Why Attend
Pre-Conference Workshop
About Us

This event was very informative and there were great ideas presented that I will be using to improve our forecasting process.

Barbara Thomas, Demand Planning Manager, Ecolab, Inc.

IBF’s 5th Annual Predictive Business Analytics, Forecasting & Planning Conference is a comprehensive program covering everything about predicting the future using new sources of data, methods, tools, talent management approaches, and more to become confident with our decision making and business plans.

Why YOU should Attend:

Understand how to create a data driven culture in your organization and win
Learn how to turn Big Data into valuable insights for better operations planning
Learn how to apply predictive analytics to the S&OP process for maximum impact
Learn how to use social media, point-of-sale (POS), syndicated data, and other attributes to predict sales
Gain knowledge on emerging technology tools for predictive analytics & business forecasting that are making organizations more profitable
Learn how to optimize inventory and customer service through improved business analytics
See the significant financial benefits that can result from improving the analytics capabilities within your organization
Learn how to mitigate risk through predictive analytics
And much more

Past Event Speakers

Ted Hanawalt

General Motors

Director, Global Long Term Forecasting and Industry Analysis

Arya Eskamani

Restaurant Services Inc.

Senior Analyst, Predictive Analytics

Chad Shumacher

Kellogg’s

Sr. Director, Global Analytics

Past Conference Schedule

Pre-Conference Workshop

May 6, 2019
Conference Day 1

May 7, 2019
Conference Day 2

May 8, 2019

May 6, IBF Members Only

12:30 PM - 1:30 PM

Pre-Conference Workshop Registration

1:30 PM - 4:30 PM

Hands-On Data Science & Predictive Analytics - 1/2 Day Workshop

This workshop will provide practical tips to incorporate into your own organization, where you’ll learn to leverage the cutting-edge of analytics technology. We will focus on data science applications for forecasting and best practices using Python. Recent advances in forecasting, often called Predictive Analytics techniques, involve the use of Big Data, including analysis of textual data like that created by social media (Facebook etc.). In this workshop, you will fully develop and script your own analytics solutions while simultaneously learning Python and its capabilities. This ½ day masterclass will be especially helpful for demand planners and forecasters looking to implement the latest advancements and next-level techniques.

I. Introduction

II. Software Overview

Popular Data Science tools
Python 101

III. Environment

Reading and summarizing data
Merging data objects
Feature engineering
Installing and initiating packages

IV. Data Cleansing & Preparation

Feature Scaling
Univariate vs Multivariate Outlier Detection
DBSCAN clustering, anomaly extraction

V. Machine Learning Module 1 – Regression

Machine Learning Defined
Comparison to Statistical Methods
Artificial Neural Networks

VI. Model Optimization

K-Fold Cross Validation
Parameter Selection
Assessing model accuracy, stability
Combining models to improve accuracy

VII. Machine Learning Module 2 – Classification

Overview of Ensemble Modeling
Random Forest Trees

VIII. Machine Learning Module 3 – Advanced Topics

Gradient Boosted Trees
Explaining model behavior
Extended R Programming

IX. Data Visualization

Plotting Basics
Advanced Graphics

X. Topics of Exploration & Closing

Arya Eskamani

Restaurant Services Inc.Senior Analyst, Predictive Analytics

5:00 PM - 7:00 PM

Early Conference Registration

Pricing

Pre-2019 Pricing
(Expires in 12 days, 4 hours)

Conference

May 6-8, 2019

Breakfast & Refreshments

Lunch

Evening Cocktail Reception

May 7, 2019

Pre-confernece Workshop

May 6, 2019 (IBF Members ONLY)

IBF Membership

(1 year)

IBF CPF Certification Exams

Fundamentals Of Demand Planning & Forecasting Book

Discount Price

SILVER	GOLD	SILVER GROUP PACKAGE (2 PERSONS)	GOLD GROUP PACKAGE (2 PERSONS)	4TH FREE - GOLD GROUP (4 PERSONS FOR PRICE OF 3)	PRE-CONFERENCE WORKSHOP: PREDICTIVE BUSINESS ANALYTICS & BIG DATA WITHIN THE SUPPLY CHAIN (IBF MEMBERS ONLY)	GOLD CERTIFY PACKAGE








$1,699.00 $1,199	$1,849.00 $1,349	$3,298.00 $2,298	$3,598.00 $2,598	$5,547.00 $4,047	$ $0	$3,049.00 $2,549

Put the IBF to Work for You!

Become an IBF Member and Start Improving Your Forecasting & Planning Performance Today.

The IBF Advantage:

IBF members include well-known company professionals that span a broad array of business sectors. By joining our organization, you can make certain that your company sets up the right forecasting & planning process and uses the best techniques available. Moreover, you can be sure that your forecasting and demand planning staff has the proper knowledge and skill set for success.

As an IBF member you receive:

A subscription to the Journal of Business Forecasting, which is primarily written by and geared toward practitioners.
Our Research Reports which include valuable benchmarking information and provide you with eye opening information on various topics in Business Forecasting and Planning.
Special discounts on our Conferences, Workshops, Training Seminars, Certification Program, as well as on any new products and services we will offer in the future.
Access to Journal of Business Forecasting Past Articles (FREE)Access to our growing online Knowledge section & Action Templates
Complimentary 1-day Tutorials at select Global events ($1000 USD Value)

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Upcoming Events & Trainings

August 12 – 13, 2019

Boston, Massachusetts USA

Business Planning, Forecasting & S&OP...

Learn more

June 19 – 21, 2019

Nashville, Tennessee USA

w/ 1-Day S&OP and Demand Management Workshop...

Learn more

June 13 – 14, 2019

Chicago, Illinois USA

...

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Event Location

Harrah's Hotel

Poydras St, 228 , New Orleans, Louisiana, USA

IBF Sleeping Room Special Rate: $219 (USD)/ night + tax

Group code: S05IBF9
Reservations: +1-877-466-7847

*Harrah's will assess a $15 fee for all reservations made via the telephone call center. This fee will not apply to reservations made via the internet.

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