Supply Chain Science

Overview

Supply Chain Science describes the collection of people, resources, and activities involved in bringing materials and information together to produce and deliver goods and services to customers. Through illustrations and analogies to everyday life, the text presents the key concepts that underlie the behavior of operations systems in a largely non-mathematical way. The goal of SCS is to provide a concise framework for understanding how complex production and supply chain systems behave, and therefore enable managers/students to have a stronger basis for management decision making. The range of problems faced by managers dealing with supply chains is almost infinite, which is why a scientific approach is needed. Many published volumes provide detailed explanations on how to solve problems in supply chain management, but they can provide answers for only a limited set of situations. Hopp’s Supply Chain Science explains why systems behave as they do, providing the tools and insights to deal effectively with almost any scenario.

Table of contents

Part I: Station Science
Chapter 1: Capacity
Chapter 2: Variability
Chapter 3: Batching

Part II: Line Science
Chapter 4: Flows
Chapter 5: Buffering
Chapter 6: Push/Pull

Part III: Network Science
Chapter 7: Inventory
Chapter 8: Risk
Chapter 9: Coordination

Appendix A: Summary of Notion
Appendix B: Supply Chain Science Principles