Institute For the Future
M5 Conference
6-7 December 2021
Tribeca Rooftop, NYC
The findings of the M5 Competition, one of the largest forecasting competitions of all time, were presented and analysed at length over the course of the two-day M5 Conference. In this respect, the Conference elaborated on the winning methods, their practical applications and broader implications, as well as how they can benefit business and other organizations.
The M5 was one of the biggest and most ambitious of all M Competitions to date. It ran from 2 March to 30 June 2020 and differed from the previous four ones in six important ways, some of which were suggested by the discussants of the M4 Competition.
The competition was a huge success with over 100,000 entries from forecasters from over 100 counties competing for the $100,000 in cash prizes. The Accuracy Challenge currently stands as Kaggle’s 6th most popular competition of all time in terms of the number of participating teams.
M5 competition
M5 conference organizers
M5 competition winners & Prizes
Accuracy Challenge Winners
| Prize | Winner |
|---|---|
| 1st Prize | YeonJun In, Senior Undergraduate, Kyung Hee University, South Korea |
| 2nd Prize | Matthias Anderer, Matthias Anderer GmbH, Germany |
| 3nd Prize | Sihyeon Seong and Yunho Jeon, MOFL Inc., South Korea |
Uncertainty Challenge Winners
| Prize | Winner |
|---|---|
| 1st Prize | David Lander, Northquay and Russ Wolfinger, SAS, USA |
| 2nd Prize | Nikolay Mamonov, GoodsForecast, Russia |
| 3rd Prize | Ioannis Nassios, Nodalpoint, Greece |
Prizes
There were 12 major prizes awarded to the winners of the M5 Competition, which were further distributed among the participants based on the hierarchical levels that their forecasts exceled and (ii) the quantiles of the uncertainty distribution that were better captured. The Prizes were awarded during our M5 Virtual Award Ceremony.
The total of the $100,000 prize money were distributed equally between the Forecasting and Uncertainty M5 competition as follows:
| Prize ID | Prize | Amount |
| 1A | Most accurate point forecast | $25,000 |
| 2A | Second most accurate point forecast | $10,000 |
| 3A | Third most accurate point forecast | $5,000 |
| 4A | Fourth most accurate point forecast | $3,000 |
| 5A | Fifth most accurate point forecast | $2,000 |
| 6A | Most accurate student point forecasts | $5,000 |
| Total: M5 Forecasting Competition, Point Forecasts | $50,000 | |
| 1B | Most precise estimation of the uncertainty distribution | $25,000 |
| 2B | Second most precise estimation of the uncertainty distribution | $10,000 |
| 3B | Third most precise estimation of the uncertainty distribution | $5,000 |
| 4B | Fourth most precise estimation of the uncertainty distribution | $3,000 |
| 5B | Fifth most precise estimation of the uncertainty distribution | $2,000 |
| 6B | Most precise student estimation of the uncertainty distribution | $5,000 |
| Total: M5 Forecasting Competition, Uncertainty Distribution | $50,000 | |
| Total: M5 Competition | $100,000 |
THE M5 CONFERENCE agenda:
ADVANCES IN FORECASTING
Monday, December 6, 2021
Tuesday, December 7, 2021
Monday, December 6, 2021
| 9:30am, 10:00am | Welcome / Opening Remarks Prof. Maria Michailidis, Director of the Makridakis Open Forecasting Center (MOFC), University of Nicosia Mr. Antonis Polemitis, CEO of the University of Nicosia Prof. Anil Gaba, The ORPAR chaired Professor of Risk Management Academic Director, Centre for Decision Making and Risk Analysis, INSEAD Prof. Spyros Makridakis, Founder of the Makridakis Open Forecasting Center, MOFC & Director of the Institute For the Future, University of Nicosia |
| 10:00am, 10:30am | Keynote Address Forecasting and the Covid-19 pandemic Nassim Nicholas Taleb, New York University |
| 10:30am, 11:00am | The Role of Judgment in Forecasting Dan Goldstein, Microsoft |
| 11:00am, 11:10am | Break |
| 11:10am, 11:40am | A Collaborative and Market-based View of the Future of Forecasting Pierre Pinson, Technical University of Denmark & Editor-in Chief IJF |
| 11:40am, 12:10pm | My New Forecasting Projects at Facebook Slawek Smyl, Facebook |
| 12:10pm, 1:00pm | Break |
| 1:00pm, 1:50pm | Assesment of Uncertainly for Decision-Making Anil Gaba, INSEAD | Robert L. Winkler, Duke University |
| 1:50pm, 2:20pm | The Most Precise Uncertainly M5 Methods. Summary of Findings Evangelos Spiliotis, National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) |
| 2:20pm, 2:40pm | The Role of Uncertainty in Supply Chain: Lessons from the M5 Competition Joannes Vermorel, Lokad |
| 2:40pm, 2:50pm | Break |
| 2:50pm, 3:20pm | An Engineering Solution to the Problem of Defining Time-Series Anomaly Peter Cotton, Intech Investments |
| 3:20pm, 3:50pm | Judgmental Forecasts and Judgmental Adjustments to Statistical/ML Forecasts Paul Goodwin, University of Bath |
| 3:50pm, 4:30pm | Panel Discussion: Expanding the Use of Systematic Forecasting in Organizations and Improving its Value: The UFO Challenge Fotios Petropoulos, University of Bath Ellen Bonnell, TrendSavants Yael Grushka-Cockayne, University of Virginia Jim Hoover, University of Florida |
Tuesday, December 7, 2021
| 9:00am, 9:10am | Opening Remarks Prof. Maria Michailidis, Director of the Makridakis Open Forecasting Center (MOFC),University of Nicosia |
| 9:10am, 9:40am | Will Artificial Intelligence Take Your Job? Addison Howard, Google Cloud AI |
| 9:40am, 10:10am | Keynote Address The Changing Role of Forecasting in the Age of Cloud Computing Chris Fry, Google |
| 10:10am, 10:20am | Break |
| 10:20am, 11:20am | The Most Accurate M5 Accuracy MethodsSummary of findings: Enno Siemsen, University of Wisconsin-Madison YeonJun In, Kyung Hee University South Korea (KHU), Winner of the Accuracy challenge, M5 Competition Sihyeon Seong & Yunho Jeon, MOFL Inc., South Korea, Third winner of the Accuracy challenge, M5 Competition |
| 11:20am, 11:40am | The Value and Applicability of the M5 Competition Jonathon Karelse, NorthFind Management |
| 11:40am, 12:10pm | Applicability of the M5 to Forecasting at Walmart John Bowman, Walmart |
| 12:10am, 12:40pm | Forecasts that Users Trust: Lessons Learned from a Large Scale Demand Forecasting Project Mahdi Yousefi, Target |
| 12:40pm, 1:00pm | Break |
| 1:00pm, 1:30pm | Deep Probabilistic Forecasting Tim Januschowski, Amazon AI Labs |
| 1:30pm, 2:00pm | M5 Competition: How Organizations can Benefit from its Findings Mike Gilliland, SAS |
| 2:00pm, 2:30pm | The Past and Future of Forecasting Competitions and the Forthcoming M6 Competition Prof. Spyros Makridakis, Founder of the Makridakis Open Forecasting Center, MOFC & Director of the Institute For the Future,University of Nicosia |
M5 Virtual Award Ceremony
The M5 Forecasting Competition ended on the 30 of June, with an amazing number of around 100,000 submissions from more than 100 countries , making it one of the largest of its kind and the fourth most popular Kaggle competition ever.
The M5 Virtual Award Ceremony took place online, on 29 October 2020, at 07:00 p.m (GMT+3 ).
