Services & Awards
Academic service
- — International Journal of Manufacturing Research
- — Special Issue “Smart Logistics and Supply Chain Management with AI-empowered Physical Internet” in International Journal of Logistics Research and Applications
- — 11th International Physical Internet Conference, 18–20 June 2025, Hong Kong. https://ipic2025.pi.events/
- — 4th IEEE International Conference on Automation in Manufacturing, Transportation and Logistics (iCaMaL2024), 7–9 Aug 2024, Hong Kong
- — 2025 大湾区物流与供应链创新联盟年会及研讨会：人工智能+赋能供应链与物流管理创新, 31 October – 2 November 2025, Zhuhai, China
- — Conference on Intelligent Networked Things (CINT2025), 13–25 June 2025, Zhuhai, China
- — 2024 Annual International Conference for Chinese Scholars in Industrial Engineering & 14th Forum for Council of Industrial Engineering and Logistics Management Department Heads, 9–11 Aug 2024, Hong Kong
- — The 19th International Congress on Logistics and SCM Systems, 7–9 June 2025, Hong Kong
- — IEEE CASE 2024: Digital twin in smart construction
- — IEEE CASE 2024: Blockchain-empowered industrial web 3.0
- — IEEE CASE 2024: Cyber-physical manufacturing for small batch customization: challenges, enabling technologies, and methodologies
- — IEEE SMC 2024: Smart and sustainable manufacturing systems
- — DILSCM 2025, Guangzhou, China
- — Nature Communications, IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications, IEEE Internet of Things Journal, Journal of Manufacturing Systems, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, International Journal of Digital Earth, Digital Twin, Advanced Engineering Informatics, Automation in Construction, Computers & Industrial Engineering, Computers & Operations Research, International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing, International Journal of Production Research, Transportation Research Part E, Annals of Operations Research, Journal of Advanced Transportation, International Journal of Production Economics, Journal of Industrial Information Integration, Journal of Network and Computer Applications, etc.
Awards
2025
- Best Report First Prize, “AI agent-enhanced operation management for Cyber-physical Internet-enabled fixed-position operation islands” (Chen, Q., Zhao, Z., Huang, G.Q.). Annual Conference of Logistics and Supply Chain Innovation Alliance of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area—Empowering Innovation in Supply Chain and Logistics Management with Artificial Intelligence
- Physical Internet Ambassador — European Union
- Best Conference Paper Award, 2nd Prize, “Look-around reasoning-enabled resource allocation in production logistics within Industry 4.0” (Li, J., Zhao, Z.). NSFC-UGC Frontiers of Digital Twins in Intelligent Manufacturing and Smart Cities
- Best Healthcare Automation Paper Award — Finalist, “Out-of-distribution modular hospital fit-out scheduling via memory-augmented deep reinforcement learning” (Han, Y., Sun, K., Zhao, Z., Huang, G.Q.). IEEE Robotics and Automation Society, IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering (CASE) 2025
- Physical Internet π-Builder Award — 2025 International Physical Internet Conference, Hong Kong, China
2024
- Best Digital Manufacturing and Human-Centered Automation Paper in Application, “Internet of Everything and Digital Twin enabled Service Platform for Cold Chain Logistics” (Wu, W., Shen, L., Zhao, Z., Harish, A., Zhong, R., Huang, G.Q.). IEEE Robotics & Automation Society, Technical Committee on Digital Manufacturing and Human-Centered Automation
- Best Paper Award, “室内定位技术驱动的车间物流智能管控方法及应用研究” (吴畏, 赵之恒, 李聪波, 黄国全). 2024 年中国工业工程年会暨第十三届工业工程企业应用与实践高峰论坛
- Highest External Competitive Research Grant Award, Bronze Award 2023/24 — Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, PolyU
- Award for High SFQ Score 2023/24 — Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, PolyU
- Best Poster Award, “DT-PosFormer: A Digital Twin-enabled Transformer Network for Precise Pose Estimation and Trajectory Prediction of MiC Modules” (Han, Y., Zhao, Z.). 10th International Physical Internet Conference, Savannah, GA, USA
2023
- Outstanding Paper Award, “Logic-based Benders Decomposition for Order Acceptance and Scheduling in Distributed Manufacturing” (Chen, J., Ma, W., Ye, X., Zhao, Z.). Annual International Conference for Chinese Scholars in Industrial Engineering & 13th Forum for Council of Industrial Engineering and Logistics Management Department Heads
- Best Paper First Prize, “On Spatial-temporal Traceability and Relativity for Industry 4.0 Applications” (Zhao, Z., Zhang, M., Chen, Q., Huang, G. Q., Wu, W.). Annual International Conference for Digital Intelligence Logistics and Supply Chain Management
Earlier
- Young Teachers Excellent Teaching Award — Nanjing University of Posts & Telecommunications, 2022
- First-class Award, Young Talent of Teaching Competition — NJUPT, 2020
- Entrepreneurship and Innovation Talent Award (江蘇省“雙創人才”) — Jiangsu Government, China, 2019
- Best Paper Award, “Optimization based transportation service trading in B2B e-commerce logistics” (Zhang, M., Huang, G. Q., Xu, S., & Zhao, Z.). The 7th Forum for Council of Industrial Engineering and Logistics Management Department Heads & The 5th Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers Asia Conference, 2016
Entrepreneurship
Dr. Zhiheng Zhao has served as the Co-founder and CEO of Gantan Limited (Hong Kong) since 2016 and Gantan Limited (Wuxi) since 2026 (www.gantanmark.com). The company was successfully selected as an Incubatee of the Cyberport Incubation Program in 2017, receiving a grant of HK$330,000. In addition, Gantan Limited (Hangzhou) secured funding of CNY ¥4,000,000 through the Hangzhou Qingshan Lake Innovation Project. Gantan's customers include Huawei Technologies Ltd, Hong Kong Air Cargo Terminals Ltd, Lenovo Group Ltd, DKSH Management Ltd, and Gree Electric Appliances Inc., among others. One Chinese patent (ZL201911070277.0) has been granted and subsequently transferred, generating a transfer value of CNY ¥60,000.