At his carpet company, Ray Anderson has increased sales and doubled profits while turning the traditional "take / make / waste" industrial system on its head. In a gentle, understated way, he shares a powerful vision for sustainable commerce.
This course surveys operations research models and techniques developed for a variety of problems arising in logistical planning of multi-echelon systems. There is a focus on planning models for production/inventory/distribution strategies in general multi-echelon multi-item systems. Topics include vehicle routing problems, dynamic lot sizing inventory models, stochastic and deterministic multi-echelon inventory systems, the bullwhip effect, pricing models, and integration problems arising in supply chain management. Probability and linear programming experience required.