Fraunhofer Institute for Material Flow and Logistics IML
Fraunhofer Institute for Material Flow and Logistics IML
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Earth from space at night with a digital communication system. Some elements of the image provided by NASA. 3D illustration

Innovations and Opportunities in Global and Space Supply Chains

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Procurement & Finance in Supply Chain Management

Enabling the digital transformation of supply chains

The "Procurement & Finance in Supply Chain Management" department plans and implements projects in various areas, including blockchain & applications, procurement & technologies, financial supply chain management & digitalization of craft. Together with research and industry partners, we work on practice-oriented and customized concepts and solutions. To achieve this, we have an interdisciplinary team of around 20 employees, 14 research assistants, and 2 apprentices from the fields of informatics, logistics, business administration, industrial engineering and finance.

News

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Digital product passport for hydrogen

Discover our 3D demonstrator for tracing green hydrogen and conveniently access the Digital Product Passport via your smartphone.
  • News (iml.fraunhofer.de)

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»TRANSPORT LOGISTICS« in Munich

From June 2 to 5, 2025, we were represented at transport logistic in Munich with the DUH-IT and SKALA projects.
  • DUH-IT (iml.fraunhofer.de)
  • SKALA (iml.fraunhofer.de)

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»SmartFutures« at the Berlin Blockchain Week

On June 12, Thuy Tien Nguyen Thi presented results on sustainable food supply chains from the ForestGuard and TRUSTyFOOD projects.
  • News (iml.fraunhofer.de)

© Fraunhofer IML

"ZUKUNFT HANDWERK" congress in Munich

From 12 to 13 March 2025, the “ZUKUNFT HANDWERK” congress took place in Munich, where Dr. Axel T. Schulte, Michael Lücke and Steffen Bölling presented innovative projects such as MINERVA and GreenCraft.
  • News (iml.fraunhofer.de)

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News article on ForestGuard at Reset.org

An Open Source Blockchain for Deforestation-Free Coffee Supply Chains.

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Open Source Blockchain Tool "ForestGuard" Released

On January 31, 2025, the "ForestGuard" tool for deforestation-free supply chains was released as open source. The code and the tool are freely accessible.

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Zeit Wissen Congress 24

On 26.09.2024, the ZEIT WISSEN congress (motto: Courage for sustainability) took place, where participants took part in a panel discussion on the topic of »How can we implement climate and environmental protection measures more quickly«.

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ForestGuard at the annual conference of Exportinitiative Umweltschutz

From September 5 to 6, the ForestGuard project was represented at the annual conference of the Export Initiative for Environmental Protection (EXI).

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ForestGuard on site - Coffee plantations in Peru

As part of the BMUV-funded »ForestGuard« project, a team from Fraunhofer IML traveled to Pichanaki, Peru, to investigate methods for verifying deforestation-free coffee supply chains.

© Feuerwehr Dortmund

SIMPEL²

As part of the "SIMPEL²" research project, participation in the command staff of the Dortmund fire department during the European Championship round of 16 match between Germany and Denmark on June 29, 2024 provided initial insights into the needs and requirements analysis and the detailed processes of a command staff in real operations.

© Fraunhofer IML

Code is Law?

On June 27, 2024, Dr. Maximilian Austerjost and Sabine Jakob accepted the invitation of Frank Schäffler MdB and took part in the 4th Blockchain Roundtable in the German Bundestag. The topic was: "Code is Law? How our law must adapt to smart contracts and legal tech".

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TECON

The TECON project uses blockchain technology in the form of NFTs (non-fungible tokens) to develop a transparent marketplace for various products. The aim is to create a way to make the supply chains of products verifiable.

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SIMPEL²

The BMBF-funded SIMPEL² project aims to research a holistic logistics concept for the chaos phase at the beginning of a major emergency situation. The aim is to adapt resilience-enhancing measures from classic supply chain management.

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IML team tracing the path of coffee

As part of the "ForestGuard" project, members of the project team had the opportunity to visit the Schirmer Kaffee GmbH plant in Dortmund and followed the path of "green coffee" to the finished product.

Our domains of expertise

 

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Space Logistics

  • To-Space-Logistic
  • In-Space-Logistic
Space Logistics
 

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Procurement

  • Technologies in procurement & SCM 
  • Success criterias & KPIs 
  • Sustainability 
  • Purchasing personas
  • Procurement & Inventory Management
More information
 

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Blockchain

  • Use cases in logistics & SCM 
  • De facto standards 
  • Interfaces & APIs
  • Asset tokenization
  • Pilot networks
More information
 

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Craft Industry

  • Use of mobile devices 
  • Digitalization assessment
  • Digital order & operation planning 
  • Tool and material planning
More information
 

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Financial Supply Chain Management

  • Supply chain financing 
  • Automated and autonomous invoicing
  • IoT-based payments
More information

Additional Information

The Team

Get to know our interdisciplinary team.

Contact Details

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Social Media

Lernen Sie unsere Arbeit kennen. Hier finden Sie unsere Podcasts und Videos.

Projects

With our research and industry projects, we cover the entire innovation chain from basic research to market entry of new products.

Project Overview

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Social Media

Get to know our work. Here you will find our podcasts and videos.

Listen & Watch

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Talks & Events

Whether attending conferences or presenting the latest research findings - here you will find an overview of all events.

event overview

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Veröffentlichungen

Lernen Sie unsere Arbeit kennen. Hier finden Sie unsere Publikationen, Podcasts und Videos.

News

Here you will find current posts from our department.

NEW POST

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Publications

You can view current publications from our department here.

Publica Database

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Networks (excerpt)

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