Successful PhD Defense of Dr. Johannes Gückel

Under the supervision of Prof. Pirmin Fontaine, Johannes made a significant contribution to the field of urban logistics and collaboration among logistics service providers. He developed innovative mathematical models, metaheuristics, and machine learning approaches to design efficient and fair cooperative city logistics systems. His work particularly addresses network design, fair cost allocation, and the practical implementation of collaboration concepts. The results demonstrate how efficiency and fairness can be jointly considered in urban freight systems. Johannes now continues his career as a Data Scientist at dm-drogerie markt. We wish him all the best for his future career.

His dissertation resulted in four scientific articles, which have been published or accepted for publication in renowned academic journals:

• Gückel, J., Crainic, T.G., & Fontaine, P. (2026). A two-step large neighborhood search for a collaborative two-tier city logistics system. European Journal of Operational Research (VHB: A).
• Gückel, J., Crainic, T.G., & Fontaine, P. (2025). Tactical planning in cooperative two-tier city logistics systems with fairness constraints. Sustainability Analytics and Modeling (VHB: B).
• Gückel, J., & Fontaine, P. (2025). Fast Shapley Value Approximation Through Machine Learning With Application in Routing Problems. Networks (VHB: A).
• Gückel, J. (2025). Approximating Shapley values with subcoalition Shapley values in routing problems. Transportation Research Procedia (VHB: C).