About

John Poppelaars has founded Doing The Math to realise his ambition to support organisations in becoming more sustainable. John is a passionate proponent of the use of data and mathematics as a key business enabler. Throughout his career, he has applied the business maxim of ‘fact-based improvement of decision making’ to numerous projects across many industries. John was awarded the Franz Edelman Award for this work at TNT Express, which resulted in substantial financial savings and CO₂ emission reduction. Next to his work for Doing The Math, John teaches at JADS and the AOG business school and is a member of the innovation board of the Dutch Platform for Mathematics.

Prior to founding his company, John was employed at BearingPoint and ORTEC. John earned a Master’s degree in Econometrics (1990) from the Erasmus University Rotterdam in the Netherlands and is INFORMS Certified Analytics Professional.

Robert Schwarz develops software tools that empower decision makers to answer their own questions. He prioritises finding the right solution approach and a high-quality implementation, and explaining how the methods work and where their limitations lie. He enjoys engaging with the open-source community and keeping up with the latest research papers.

Robert studied mathematics in Heidelberg and did research at the Zuse Institute Berlin, working on optimisation problems for gas network operation and expansion planning. He later managed development of a web-based platform for next-generation modelling and applications at LITIC.

Bernard Zweers has experience with using analytical methods to solve business challenges in both healthcare and supply chain applications. He believes that the mathematical model should capture all the complexity of business problems, but that the solution should always be computed in such a way that it is understandable for everyone.
Bernard holds a PhD degree in mathematics from the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam. In his PhD research, he developed mathematical models and algorithms to optimise inland container transportation.

Felix Hennings is driven by the urge to understand complex systems and processes, which enables him to find specialized solution strategies for a given problem or uncover potential for improvement. He is experienced in creating decision-support systems for industrial problems, knows the relevance of clean and accessible data for a successful project, and believes in the benefit of a high-quality and well-documented implementation that ensures long-term maintainability.

Felix studied Business Mathematics at the Technische Universität Berlin. Afterward, he worked at the Zuse Institute Berlin on optimizing the operation of large real-world gas transport networks, which is also the research topic of his soon-to-be-completed PhD degree.

Benjamin Sluijter has always had a passion for mathematics. This first led him to the national math Olympiad finals in high school and it made him choose to study Physics, which in his eyes is just applied mathematics. Previously, he put his Data Science knowledge to practice at DSW health insurances, making him comfortable with working with large datasets.
During his bachelor he particularly enjoyed programming, which made him choose his current research master at the University of Leiden in classical/quantum information: a mix between Physics and Data Science.

Lars van der Meer is currently in his third year of the Bachelor of Econometrics and Operations Research at the Erasmus University Rotterdam in the Netherlands. He is particularly drawn toward the operations research side and is eager to find meaningful applications of his knowledge, such as in the field of sustainability.