Abstract

In this talk we show how data-driven research fosters the development of new engineering and scientific methods that explain, predict, and change behavior. We report on a few projects with online and brick-and-mortar retailers where we combine machine learning, optimization and econometrics techniques to improve business performance.

About the speaker

Prof. David Simchi-Levi is the MIT William Barton Rogers Professor, named after MIT’s founder and first president, and a Professor of Engineering Systems at MIT. He also leads the MIT Data Science Lab and is widely recognized as a leading authority in supply chain management and business analytics.

His Ph.D. graduates hold faculty positions at top institutions, including UC Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon, Columbia, Cornell, Duke, Georgia Tech, Harvard, Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Michigan, Purdue, and Virginia Tech.

Prof. Simchi-Levi served as Editor-in-Chief of Management Science (2018–2023) and previously led Operations Research (2006–2012) and Naval Research Logistics (2003–2005). In 2023, he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering. He received the INFORMS Impact Prize (2020) for pioneering risk mitigation strategies in global supply chains and is an INFORMS Fellow and MSOM Distinguished Fellow. His accolades include the Koopman Award (2020), Ford Engineering Excellence Award (2015), and multiple INFORMS practice prizes.

An entrepreneur, he founded LogicTools (acquired by IBM in 2009), co-founded OPS Rules (joined Accenture in 2016), and Opalytics (acquired by Accenture Applied Intelligence in 2018).