Supply Chain Engineering: Useful Methods and Techniques

Supply Chain Engineering considers how modern production and operations management (POM) techniques can respond to the pressures of the competitive global marketplace by integrating all activities in the supply chain, adding flexibility to the system, and drastically reducing production cost.

Several POM challenges are answered through a comprehensive analysis of concepts and models that assist the selection of outsourcing strategies and dynamic pricing policies. Supply Chain Engineering presents inventory management techniques in supply chains, radio frequency identification (RFID) technologies, and methods for the design of flexible and re-configurable manufacturing systems, as well as real-time assignment and scheduling methods. A significant part of the book is also devoted to:

- lean manufacturing,

- line balancing (assembly lines, U-lines, and bucket brigades),

- dynamic facilities layout approaches, and

- new warehousing techniques.

Explanations are given using basic examples and detailed algorithms, while discarding complex and unnecessary theoretical minutiae. In addition, all the examples have been carefully selected with a view to eventual industrial application.

Supply Chain Engineering is written for students and professors in industrial and systems engineering, management science, operations management, and business. It is also an informative reference for industrial managers looking to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their production systems.

Alexandre Dolgui is Director of the Centre for Industrial Engineering and Computer Science at the Ecole des Mines de Saint-Etienne (France). His principal research focuses on manufacturing line design, production planning and supply chain optimization. At present, he has published 5 books, about 130 papers in refereed journals and 25 book chapters.

Professor Dolgui is the Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Production Research, an Area Editor of Computers and Industrial Engineering, and Associate Editor of the Omega and the IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics. He is also an editorial board member of several journals, including the International Journal of Production Economics, the International Journal of Systems Sciences (past Associate Editor) and the International Journal of Manufacturing Technology and Management. He was guest editor of special issues of Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, International Journal of Production Research, International Journal of Production Economics, Journal of Mathematical Modeling and Algorithms, European Journal of Operational Research and Annual Reviews in Control. He has been Scientific Chair of several major international symposiums and conferences. Prof. Dolgui has been the supervisor of 18 PhD theses in France.

He is a member of various international advisory councils, such as the Board of the International Foundation for Production Research; Founding member of the European Virtual Institute on Innovation in Industrial Supply Chains and Logistic Networks and chairman of IFAC Technical Committee on Manufacturing Modelling for Management and Control.

Prof. Jean-Marie Proth is currently Consultant, Researcher and an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics. He has been Research Director at INRIA (National Institute for Computer Science and Automation), leader of the SAGEP (Simulation, Analysis and Management of Production Systems) team and the Lorraine research centre of INRIA, Associate Member in the Laboratory of Mechanical Engineering, University of Maryland, University Professor in France, as well as at the European Institute for Advanced Studies in Management (Brussels). He has carried on close collaboration with several US universities. His main research focuses on operations research techniques, Petri nets and data analysis for production management, especially facility layout, scheduling and supply chains.

Prof. Proth has authored or coauthored 15 books (text books and monographs) and more than 150 papers in major peer-reviewed international journals. He is the author or coauthor of about 300 papers for international conferences and 7 book chapters, the editor of 8 proceedings of international conferences, 55 times an invited speaker or invited professor throughout the world.

J.-M. Proth was the supervisor of 28 PhD theses in France and the USA. He was also a coeditor of the journal Applied Stochastic Models and Data Analysis. He was an Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Robotics and Automation (1995-1998). He was guest editor of Engineering Costs and Production Economics and several other refereed international journals. He has been the Chairman of the Program Committee of various international conferences, an officer of several professional societies, for example: International Society for Productivity Enhancement, Vice-President of Flexible Automation, 1992-1995.