Edelman Award Ceremony
Recognizing Distinction in Applications of Analytics, Operations Research, and the Management Sciences
The Franz Edelman Award, emphasizing beneficial impact; INFORMS Prize, emphasizing long-term, multi-project success; Daniel H. Wagner Prize, emphasizing innovative methods and clear exposition; and the UPS George D. Smith Prize, emphasizing effective academic preparation, will be awarded at this elegant presentation. Admission to the award ceremony is included in your registration fee. The ceremony begins at 5:30pm.
Since 1972, INFORMS and the OR/MS and analytics community has celebrated and honored the very best in applied work in business or government with the annual Franz Edelman Award Competition. 2021 marks the 50th anniversary of this outstanding and rigorous competition. Since 2006, we have marked this special occasion with the Edelman Award Ceremony, an evening filled with fun, excitement, and pride for the entire community. The 2021 Award Ceremony, scheduled for Tuesday, April 13, promises to have hundreds of international analytics professionals and business leaders in attendance.
Thank You to Our Sponsors
Edelman Executive Level
INFORMS Prize
This prize is awarded annually to the company that effectively integrates analytics into organizational decision-making, and has repeatedly applied ORMS principles in pioneering, novel and lasting ways. The 2021 prize winner, Amazon, will describe their innovative O.R. work in the INFORMS Prizes and Special Sessions Track on Wednesday, April 14 at 11am EDT. The 2021 winner will be recognized at the Edelman Awards Ceremony on Tuesday, April 13.
Previous winners include: Booz Allen Hamilton, B.N.S.F. Railways, Disney, U.S. Air Force, GM, Chevron, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, Sasol, Jeppesen, Intel, General Electric Global Research Center, Schneider National, Air Products and Chemicals, Procter & Gamble, UPS and other leading companies.
UPS George D. Smith Prize
The George D. Smith Prize is aimed at strengthening ties between academia and industry by rewarding institutions of higher education for effective and innovative preparation of students to be good practitioners of operations research. The Prize is generously underwritten by UPS. Awarded for the first time in 2012, past winners are Carnegie Mellon University, H. John Heinz III College, Sauder School of Business, University of British Columbia – Center for Operations Excellence, MIT Leaders for Global Operations, Naval Postgraduate School, and Tauber Institute for Global Operations at University of Michigan.
The 2021 Competitors are:


Mili Mehrotra

Vishal Sachdev

Sridhar Seshadri

Ramanath Subramanyam


Gedas Adomavicius

Ravi Bapna

Alok Gupta

De Liu

Ellen Trader


Ann Campbell

Nanette Chapa

Lindsey Peters

Zach Veigulis
The teams will present their work to the judges on Friday, April 9. Videos of the competition will be found in the video on-demand library on the virtual meeting platform.
The Smith Prize winner will be announced at the Edelman Awards Ceremony on Tuesday, April 13. The 2021 winner will give their presentation on Wednesday, April 14 in the INFORMS Prizes & Special Sessions Track.
Daniel H. Wagner Prize for Excellence in Operations Research
The Daniel H. Wagner competition is held each fall at the INFORMS Annual Meeting. The 2020 Wagner Prize Reprise will take place on Monday, April 12 in the INFORMS Prizes & Special Sessions Track.
The 2020 Wagner winning submission was authored by:

Saurabh Bansal

Genaro J. Gutierrez

Mahesh Nagarajan
Distribution Estimation and Efficient Optimization for Portfolio Management in Agribusiness: Analytical Developments and Benefits
We worked with an agribusiness firm to develop new mathematical algorithms to manage the firm’s annual $1 Billion portfolio of more than 200 seeds offered to farmers in the continental U.S. The algorithms included, (i) optimization-development to deduce probability distributions for production yields for new products when managers provide partial information for the distributions, and (ii) a decomposition based development to optimize the production plan for the firm’s portfolio with more than 600 uncertainties. The algorithms have yielded substantial monetary savings and intangible benefits.
This prize emphasizes the quality and coherence of the analysis used in practice. Dr. Wagner strove for strong mathematics applied to practical problems, supported by clear and intelligible writing. The Wagner Prize recognizes those principles by emphasizing good writing, strong analytical content and verifiable practice successes. The competition is held and the winner is announced at the INFORMS Annual Meeting in the fall.
Past awardees include practitioners and researchers from Lehigh University and the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, The Forestry Research Institute of Sweden, CDC, Ford, U.S. Coast Guard, Intel, IBM T. J. Watson Research, Schneider National, Boston University, University of Florida, and others.
Consider applying for the 2021 Wagner Prize competition!
Submission deadline
May 2, 2021
Innovative Applications in Analytics Award (IAAA)
Sponsored by INFORMS Analytics Society, Kinaxis, and Adelphi University
The IAAA Finalists will present on Tuesday, April 13 in the INFORMS Prizes & Special Sessions Track. The winner will be announced at the closing plenary session on Wednesday, April 14.
The purpose this award is to recognize the creative and unique application of a combination of analytical techniques in a new area. The prize promotes the awareness and value of the creative combination of analytics techniques in unusual applications to provide insights and business value. The Analytics Section leadership would like to cordially thank all the members of the judging committee for their hard work in selecting these finalists.
Learn more about the Innovative Applications in Analytics Award here.
Finalist Teams and Abstracts:
Tuesday, April 13 at 1:45pm EDT
Tuesday, April 13 at 2:25pm EDT
Tuesday, April 13 at 3:05pm EDT
Tuesday, April 13 at 3:45pm EDT
Tuesday, April 13 at 4:25pm EDT
Tuesday, April 13 at 5pm EDT
Syngenta Crop Challenge in Analytics
Brought to you by INFORMS Analytics Society
Powered by IdeaConnection
The population of Earth is growing daily and our world is running out of land needed to produce food. Meanwhile, the crops farmers plant face escalating challenges due to increasingly variable growing conditions and climate change.
Today, the agriculture industry works to maximize the amount of food we gain from crops by breeding plants with the strongest, highest-yielding genetics. Plant breeding is complex, and data analytics can help scientists at research and development organizations like Syngenta make advances in seed product development
Syngenta has proven that data-driven strategies can help our industry accelerate innovation and breed better seeds that require fewer resources and are adaptable to more diverse environments. Developing models that can predict the performance of potential corn products can help scientists more accurately select seeds that increase the productivity of the crops farmers plant – and will help address the growing global food demand.
Teams will put their analytics skills to the test for a chance to win up to $5,000.
The finalists will present on Monday, April 12. The winner will be announced at the closing plenary session on Wednesday, April 14.
Learn more about the Syngenta Crop Challenge here.
Finalist Teams:
Monday, April 12 at 10am EDT
Monday, April 12 at 10:30am EDT
Monday, April 12 at 11am EDT
Monday, April 12 at 11:30am EDT