Fall 2000

ME/IE 8773-8774

Ordering Systems for Multi-Echelon Inventory Control

by

Professor Sven Axsater
Department of Industrial Engineering
Lund University
P.O. Box 118, S-22100 Lund, SWEDEN

Wednesday, November 15, 2000
3:30-5:00 p.m.
Room 108 ME
Broadcast on UNITE Channel A

Coffee and cookies will be available in 152 ME following the seminar

In this seminar common ordering policies for multi-level inventory control are compared. Especially we discuss circumstances under which certain types of policies dominate other policies. We first consider installation stock and echelon stock (R, Q) policies in serial and assembly systems. It is shown that, under some assumptions, an installation stock reorder point policy can always be replaced by an equivalent echelon stock reorder point policy. Next we discuss Material Requirements P lanning. It can be shown that for general inventory systems any installation stock (R, Q) policy can be duplicated by an MRP system. Finally we discuss Kanban-policies and their relationship to other ordering policies.

Dr. Sven Axsater got his degree at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, 1967. He held a Research Fellowship at Stanford University, 1967-1968, and was a consultant in Operations Research 1969-1972. He then joined Linkoping In stitute of Technology as Associate Professor. During 1980 he was visiting Professor at North Carolina State University. He became Professor of Production Economics in 1982. In 1984 he left Linkoping for a professorship at Lulea University of Technology. H e became Professor of Production Management at Lund University in 1993. Prof. Axsater's research has mainly been in the area of production and inventory control. Past and current interests include: hierarchical production planning, lot sizing, and most r ecently multi-echelon inventory systems.

Prof. Axsater has been President of the International Society of Inventory Research, and Regional Vice President of the Production and Operations Management Society. He is serving as Associate Editor of Operations Research and Managemen t Science, and as Area Editor of Production and Operations Management. He has published in the leading journals in his research area. He is a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences.

Informal Faculty Luncheon: Wednesday, November 15, 2000, 12:00 noon, McCormick's Restaurant, Radisson Hotel Metrodome. Prof. Axsater will be able to attend.