Former Members

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    Prof. Dr. Isik Bicer

    Dr. Isik Bicer has been appointed as a tenure-track Assistant Professor at the Rotterdam School of Management of the Erasmus University as of Jan 1, 2017.
    He joined the TOM chair of Prof. Ralf Seifert in September 2014 and worked at EPFL until he started at the Erasmus university.
    Prior to joining the EPFL, Dr. Bicer obtained his PhD degree on the mitigation of supply chain risks from the University of Lausanne.
    Dr. Bicer also holds an MSc degree in Industrial Engineering from Bogazici University and double-major degrees in Industrial and Mechanical Engineering from the Middle East Technical University. He also has industry experience of 4.5 years in finance and pharmaceutical sectors.

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    Dr. Joana Maria Comas

    Born in Palma de Mallorca, Joana M. Comas received a Master’s in Industrial Engineering from the Polytechnical University of Catalonia, Barcelona-Spain, in 2005, having completed the 2003/2004 academic year at the University of Victoria, Canada, and her Master thesis in the Automatic Control Laboratory at the EPFL. She then worked for over a year in Nestlé-Nespresso’s logistics department on integrating new tools, such as production planning software and a stock location management system. She was also responsible for production planning. After this experience in industry, she was a research assistant of the Production Management and Processes Laboratory at the EPFL, and during 2007, she was responsible for a European project with industrial partners to develop a forecasting software tool to be integrated into an enterprise resource planning system (ERP).
    In 2008, she joined the chair of Technology and Operations Management (TOM) to pursue a PhD. She defended her doctoral thesis entitled “Corporate Environmental Strategies: Towards Supply Chain Approaches” in 2012.

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    Dr. René Glogg

    Dr. René Yves Glogg received his M.Sc. degree in Mathematics from the University of Zurich in 2010. Since then, he has been involved as a specialist in mathematical optimization in multiple projects for Deutsche Bahn, Witron and Marenco. In September 2016, he joined Prof. Dr. Seifert’s research team in order to pursue a PhD.​ Mr Glogg successfully completed his PhD entitled “Modeling Supply Chain Disruptions: A network flow approach” in April 2021.

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    Prof. Dr. Olov Isaksson

    Prof. Dr. Olov Isaksson received his Master’s Degree in Industrial Engineering and Management from Linköping University, Sweden and a Diplôme D’Ingénieur in General Engineering from Ecole Centrale Paris. Following his studies, he worked for two years as a project manager in Operations and Supply Chain Management with Henkel in Germany.
    Olov joined the chair of Technology and Operations Management in 2009 to pursue a PhD. His primary research interests lie in operations management and its interface with econometrics, finance and innovation management. In his dissertation, titled “Operational Decisions and Supply Chain Dynamics: An Empirical Investigation”, he uses secondary data to investigate how operational actions affect the performance of the firm and its supply chain partners.
    Olov successfully completed his PhD “Operational Decisions and Supply Chain Dynamics: An Empirical Investigation” in December 2013. In January 2015 Olov joined the Stockholm Business School of Stockholm University as an Assistant Professor in Operations Management.

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    Dr. Argyro Katsifou

    Argyro Katsifou received her Diplom-Ingenieur in Computer and Communication Engineering from the University of Thessaly, Greece. Following her studies she worked as a software engineer in Helic Inc. as an RF IC specialist. She was also a student at Athens University of Economics and Business in the department of Business Administration.
    In 2009, she joined the chair of Technology and Operations Management (TOM) to pursue her doctoral studies. Argyro completed her PhD in June 2013 at TOM, entitled: Variable Product Portfolio Management in Retail Operations.

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    Dr. Yara Kayyali Elalem

    Dr. Yara Kayyali Elalem graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the American University of Beirut in 2016. She then joined the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne where she obtained a Master’s in Management, Technology, and Entrepreneurship, with a Minor in Systems Engineering. She joined the Chair of Technology and Operations Management in September 2018 to pursue a PhD. Dr. Kayyali Elalem successfully completed her PhD entitled “Optimizing Sales Forecasting, Inventory, Pricing and Sourcing Decisions” in March 2023.

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    Dr. Mervegül Kirci

    Dr. Merve Kirci received her B.Sc in Civil Engineering from the Middle East Technical University in Turkey. She completed her Masters studies in EPFL, majoring in Environmental Engineering with a minor in Management of Technology and Entrepreneurship. She completed her Master project at Nestlé focusing on environmental sustainability in global distribution before joining Prof. Seifert’s Technology and Operations Management team in September 2013, to pursue a PhD. Dr. Kirci successfully completed her PhD “Improving Firm Performance through Sustainable Operations” in September 2017.

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    Dr. Rachel Lacroix

    Dr. Rachel Lacroix graduated with a Master’s degree from Arts et Métiers ParisTech (ENSAM), specializing in industrial engineering/management and operations research. Concurrently, she followed a Strategic Brand Management course (Marketing Management M.Sc.) in partnership with EDHEC Business School whereupon she worked as a junior consultant at Aerial, Paris, focusing on digital transformation projects. In March 2017, Dr. Lacroix joined Prof. Seifert’s Technology and Operations Management team to pursue a PhD. She successfully completed her PhD entitled “Industry 4.0 Technologies and Customer-centricity for Digital Supply Chains” in June 2021.

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    Dr. Kerstin Langenberg

    Kerstin Langenberg worked as a Research and Teaching Assistant at TOM between September 2004 and August 2008. She completed her PhD thesis in 2008 entitled “Modeling and implementing strategies for supply chain alignment”.
    During her time at TOM, Kerstin pursued part of her research at the Sloan School of Management of MIT for seven months. Kerstin took a position in the industry in Germany in September 2008.

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    Dr. Shuangqing Liao

    Dr. Shuangqing Liao worked as a post-doctoral researcher in the chair of Technology & Operations Management (TOM). In 2011, Dr. Liao earned her Ph.D. degree in the Department of Industrial Engineering from Ecole Centrale Paris, France. She also holds a Master’s degree in automatic control in China, and a Diplôme D’Ingénieur in General Engineering from Ecole Centrale Paris in France. Her Ph.D. study focused on operation management of service systems and deals with the optimization of call center performance in a stochastic setting, where some critical parameters are assumed to be uncertain. Her research combines ideas from stochastic modeling with robust programming.

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    Prof. Dr. Florian Lücker

    Dr. Florian Lücker received his M.Sc. Degree in Physics from ETH Zurich in 2012. During his studies he spent six months as an intern at UBS Investment Bank where he joined the precious metal team.
    Florian joined Prof. Seifert’s team at the chair of Technology and Operations Management in 2012, focusing his research on supply chain strategy. He successfully completed his PhD “Supply Chain Disruption Risk Management: Modeling Risk Mitigation Strategies” in December 2016.  Dr. Florian Lücker was hired by Cass Business School, University of London (UK), as Lecturer in Operations and Supply Chain Management, as of January 2018.

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    Prof. Dr. Sebastian Maier

    Dr. Sebastian Maier was a postdoctoral researcher at Prof. Seifert’s Chair of Technology & Operations Management (TOM) from February 2019 to May 2020. He joined the Department of Statistical Science at University College London (UCL) as a Lecturer (equivalent to Assistant Professor) in June 2020. In 2018, Sebastian was appointed Visiting Fellow at the Centre for the Analysis of Time Series in the Department of Statistics at the London School of Economics (LSE). He received his PhD degree from Imperial College London in 2017, where he also worked as a research associate in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Before joining Imperial College in 2013, he worked as a visiting researcher on a renewable energy R&D project at PUC-Rio (Brazil) as part of his MSc in Operational Research at the University of Edinburgh. Prior to this, he graduated from the Technical University of Vienna with a BSc in Electrical Engineering and Information Technology and was also awarded an MSc in Energy Engineering from the same university (2011).

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    Dr. Richard Markoff

    Dr. Richard Markoff has worked in Supply Chain for L’Oréal for 22 years, in Canada, the U.S. and France. His experience spans the entire value chain from manufacturing, supplier relations, S&OP, distribution to customer collaboration. His last role at L’Oréal was as Global Supply Chain Standards Director, driving supply chain excellence. Richard has a degree in Chemical Engineering (McGill University, Montreal), an MBA in Supply Chain Management (Northeastern University, Boston) and is currently a Supply Chain coach, consultant and lecturer. Richard successfully completed his PhD in Supply Chain Management (ESCP, Paris).

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    Dr. Philipp Moser

    Dr. Philipp Moser received his Master’s Degree in Microtechnology from EPFL in 2010. Subsequently he joined McKinsey & Company in their Geneva office for almost 3 years working mainly on operations and strategy related topics across industries.He joined Prof. Seifert’s team of Technology and Operations Management in September 2013 to pursue a PhD. Philipp conducted his doctoral research in the field of operations management. He successfully completed his PhD “Supply Chain Management in Process Industries: Empirical Investigations for Commodity Markets,” in October 2016, whereupon he joined McKinsey as an associate.

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    Prof. Dr. Margarita Protopappa

    /webdav/site/tom/shared/People Pictures/Margarita Protopappa-alumni.jpg Margarita Protopappa worked as a Research and Teaching Assistant at TOM between February 2005 and February 2009. She wrote her PhD thesis entitled “Interrelating Operational and Financial Performance Measurements in Inventory Theory”.The domain of her research is financial supply chain management and working capital management.
    Margarita became an Assistant Professor at the European Business School in Germany in March 2009.

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    Dr. Daniel Seifert

    /webdav/site/tom/users/178044/public/Daniel Seifert photo 100x129.jpg Daniel Seifert conducts research at the interface of operations and finance. Primarily, he studies the link between accounts receivable, accounts payable, and firm performance.  He earned his PhD entitled: “Collaborative Working Capital Management in Supply Network” from Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). As part of his studies, he completed a three months stay as Visiting Researcher at Waseda University, Tokyo.
    Prior to joining EPFL, Daniel worked at McKinsey & Company. Before his consulting experience, he completed internships with Deutsche Bank in London, Chanel in Paris, and DaimlerChrysler in Berlin. Daniel holds a Diplom-Ingenieur in Industrial Engineering and Management from Technical University Berlin and a Masters degree from ESCP Europe.

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    Dr. Marcel Sieke


    In 2005, Marcel Sieke joined the TOM team for a year, as a visiting PhD student from the University of Cologne.

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    Prof. Dr. Jean-Sébastien Tancrez

    Jean-Sébatien Tancrez has been hired by Louvain School of Management, Catholic University of Mons, Belgium, as an Assistant Professor in Operations Management and Supply Chain Management.
    Jean-Sébastien Tancrez joined Prof. Ralf Seifert’s team in 2009 as a Post-Doctoral Fellow, after having earned his PhD from the Center for Operations Research and Econometrics at Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium. He also holds a Master’s degree in Mathematical Engineering. During his Ph.D. studies, his main subject was the modelling of general queueing networks. He also applied stochastic modelling in the field of healthcare management, and was involved in a research project with the company AGC, to model and optimize its reverse logistics network. He spent six months in Ireland, as a visiting Ph.D. student in the School of Computer Science and Informatics at University College Dublin. During his post-doctoral at EPFL, he focused his research on operations management, and supply chain management in particular.
    Prof. Dr. Tancrez joined the Louvain School of Management in September 2011.

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    Dr. Jana Thiel

    Jana Thiel joined TOM in 2005 for two years to work on a joint research project between EPFL and IMD. The project led to a case book on science-based start-ups.
    Jana completed her PhD in Management of Technology at EPFL, where she also worked as research assistant for the Chair of Entrepreneurship and Technology Commercialization.

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    Dr. Arnaud X. Varé

    Arnaud X. Varé was a Research and Teaching Assistant at TOM between April 2004 and April 2008. He wrote a doctoral thesis entitled “Managing Competing Technology Standards in the Digital Economy“. In this work, he studies tactical choices of companies engaged in standards battles and especially the implications of converter introduction between incompatible technologies in the presence of network effects.
    During his time at TOM, Arnaud was able to pursue part of his research at the department Management Science & Engineering (MS&E) of Stanford University for seven months. Arnaud took a position in industry in June 2008.

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    Dr. Andrey Vasilyev

    Dr. Andrey Vasilyev obtained a B.Sc. degree in Mathematics from the Higher School of Economics (National Research University, Moscow), followed by a M.Sc. degree in Operational Research with Data Science from the University of Edinburgh. In September 2018, Dr. Vasilyev joined the Chair of Technology and Operations Management in order to pursue a PhD. He successfully completed his PhD entitled “Quantitative Methods for Omnichannel Decision-Making” in November 2023.

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    Dr. Ariel Zeballos

    Ariel Zeballos holds a Bachelors Degree in Computational Engineering Science from the University of California Berkeley. As an undergraduate, he worked for the Thermal Hydraulics lab at UCB doing research with fluid dynamics for a prototype of a fusion nuclear plant. Then, he worked at Lawrence Berkeley Lab continuing this research with a focus on coupling triangular meshes to his simulations. He, then, decided to apply his simulation and modeling experience towards industrial engineering topics.
    He holds a Masters in Science degree from UCB in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research. Ariel Zeballos completed his PhD in April 2013 at TOM. Research focus: Supply Chain and Finance.

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    Dr. Romulo Zequeira

    Romulo Zequeira joined the TOM team in 2005, as a Post-Doctoral Researcher.
    He worked for two years with Prof. Ralf Seifert and has now taken a position in the industry.

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