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Faculty of mechanical engineering
The picture shows the old building of the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering. © Jürgen Huhn​/​TU Dortmund

Workshop on Sales and Demand Planning and AI - 3rd meeting of the project accompanying committee in PrABCast

Prof. Deuse welcomes the participants to the workshop. © IPS​/​TU Dortmund
On June 26, 2024, over 20 participants from companies - members of the PrABCast project support committee and interested NIRO members - came together to take part in a workshop on "Sales planning and prediction and AI: insights and application" and the 3rd project support committee of the project. The event took place at NIRO in Dortmund harbour section and was organized by our partner RIF Institut für Forschung und Transfer e. V. in close cooperation with NIRO.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Jochen Deuse, Marius Syberg and Lucas Polley gave an overview of the importance of sales forecasts for various business areas such as production, sales, purchasing and logistics. The focus was on the fact that machine learning processes learn from historical data in order to make precise predictions. This can be adapted for forecasting sales. In addition, the latest results from PrABCast were presented and discussed.

The workshop was divided into two parts.
First, there was a discussion on possible questions and objectives of sales forecasting. Various questions and objectives relating to sales planning and forecasting in manufacturing companies were developed. The discussion highlighted the challenges and the importance of precise sales forecasts. In particular, the connection between the processes for which the sales forecast is to be improved and the sales planning itself became clear.

The second part focused on interactive work on the software solution for the PrABCast project. The participants worked interactively on an AI-supported software solution that was developed as part of the project. This practical exercise enabled them to actively participate in the design of the solution.

Overall, the lively discussion among the more than 20 participants showed that there is generally great interest in the use of AI in sales planning. The next crucial step for the future and implementation in companies is to reduce existing barriers such as a lack of expertise and low data quality. The discussions also made it clear that human intuition and knowledge of one's own processes, markets and products are still essential in order to achieve the best results.

The successful workshop has sparked interest in future events. In the area of sales planning, another project is already being applied for. The IPS and NIRO are planning new workshops to further promote the use of AI in various areas of the company.

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