Research & Advisory Hub | Advancing retail intelligence through research & insights

Welcome to invent.ai’s research & advisory hub, a central resource showcasing the thought leadership, research and perspectives of our Scientific Advisory Board.

Led by the world’s foremost retail scholars and PhD experts, the hub bridges academia and real-world retail, translating pioneering research into actionable strategies. Drawing on decades of scholarly rigor and deep domain knowledge, our advisors help retailers anticipate market trends, optimize operations and make confident, AI-driven decisions.

Thought leadership features

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Scientific board feature

How AI is transforming store layouts and product assortment planning

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Forbes Technology Council

Lessons from building an AI company that thinks like a retailer

News - invent.ai and Retailer Partners Win 2025 Women in Supply Chain Awards

Harvard Business Review

The solution to service-worker churn

Explore our content

This hub serves as a living library of ideas, connecting rigorous scholarship with practical knowledge for retailers, innovators and industry leaders.

Research & commentary: In-depth analysis of emerging trends, academic perspectives and evidence-based approaches shaping next-generation retail strategies.
Blogs: Practical examples demonstrating how AI optimizes operations and supports informed decision-making.
Articles & thought leadership: Ongoing contributions from our advisors, including research highlights and academic insights.
Webinars: Expert-led sessions offering interactive discussions on retail innovation, AI applications and industry trends.

The research & advisory hub is continually updated with new insights, research and discussions from our Scientific Advisory Board.

Explore, learn and return often to discover the latest ideas shaping the future of retail.

Gurhan Kok, Founder & CEO

Research

Size substitution and its role in assortment and inventory planning

Felipe Caro, a scientific advisor at invent.ai, and Yi-Chun Akchen explore how retailers can improve assortment and inventory planning by accounting for size substitution.

These insights help retailers use AI to optimize inventory, better meet demand and complement invent.ai’s coordinated merchandising and allocation solutions.

View the report

Size substitution and its role in assortment and inventory planning.

Positioning omnichannel inventories to protect revenue

Victor Martínez-de-Albéniz, a scientific advisor at invent.ai, co-authored research exploring how retailers can strategically allocate limited inventory between online and offline channels.

By positioning stock where it generates the most revenue and protecting higher-margin channels, retailers can optimize fulfillment, improve margins and make better omnichannel allocation decisions.

Explore the full insights

Omnichannel fulfillment for a shoe retailer.

A personalized content-based method to predict customers’ preferences in an online apparel retailer

Co-authored research from Gurhan Kok, founder & CEO at invent.ai, cited by International Journal of Production Economics and International Journal on Advanced Science Engineering and Information Technology, explores how AI can better predict customer preferences in online apparel retail.

The study looks at how retailers can use customer clicks, purchases and product attributes like color and brand to deliver more personalized product recommendations.

View the full research

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The resilience of fashion retail stores

Co-authored research by Victor Martínez-de-Albéniz, a scientific advisor at invent.ai and professor at IESE Business School, examines how store-level characteristics such as assortment strategy and inventory freshness affect how well fashion retailers withstand major external shocks.

The study finds that retailers with more differentiated assortments and fresher inventory tend to be more resilient, showing stronger performance stability when faced with disruption and volatility.

View the research

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The value of experience-centric stores in omnichannel retail: A multi-method approach at the category level

Co-authored research by Gurhan Kok, founder and CEO of invent.ai, examines how omnichannel retailers can design and evaluate physical stores based on their role in the customer journey.

The study finds that experience-centric stores can increase total revenue when they are aligned with the right product categories, while smaller convenience-focused formats are less effective. It also highlights that store opening outcomes vary by category, showing that store performance depends on how well in-store capabilities match customer needs across different types of products.

Read the full study

Webinar - Omnichannel is the new customer expectation – what it means for inventory-1

Maximizing retail efficiency through AI insights

In this video, Jiri Nechleba, Scientific Advisor at invent.ai, explains how AI can transform retail operations by connecting siloed data and orchestrating decisions across inventory, merchandising and the supply chain.

By analyzing every item at every store, retailers can maximize profitability, optimize inventory placement and make better financial decisions at the atomic level.