Title:

Inventory management: new models, challenges, and opportunities

Abstract:

Recent years witness novel business models and new challenges in inventory management. In this talk, I will present several research projects motivated by current practice and collaborations with industry partners: inventory models with large lead times, inventory allocation in omnichannel retailing, and operations in smart shelves. The theoretical and practical challenges and opportunities will be highlighted. I will also briefly introduce some other research projects on data-driven modeling in online platforms and retailing and the application of discrete convex analysis to operations models.

Bio:

Xin Chen is a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He obtained his PhD from MIT in 2003, MS from Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1998 and BS from Xiangtan University in 1995. His research interest lies in optimization, data analytics, revenue management and supply chain management. He received the Informs revenue management and pricing section prize in 2009. He is the coauthor of the book “The Logic of Logistics: Theory, Algorithms, and Applications for Logistics and Supply Chain Management (Second Edition, 2005, & Third Edition, 2014)”, and serving as the department editor of logistics and supply chain management of Naval Research Logistics and an associate editor of several journals including Operations Research, Management Science, and Production and Operations Management.