Supply Chain Network Design: Understanding the Optimization behind Supply Chain Design Projects

This book is aimed at an important and under-served niche within the supply chain market: strategic supply chain design. Almost all supply chain professionals need to know about this discipline. No current book covers the theory and practice in a way that ensures readers will be successful with this discipline in the field. Strategic network design is about selecting the right number, location, and size of warehouses, plants, and production lines. It is about determining the territories of your facilities, what product should be made where, and how product should flow through the supply chain. It is about developing a good model of your supply chain so you can make good operational decisions. Network design is important because a good design helps a firm execute its strategy. To do it right, it requires analytics and optimization. And, when firms do it right, they can reduce supply chain costs by 5-15% which can translate into tens of millions of dollars of savings for the firm. The book brings together our experience in completing 100s of these projects, our teaching of this material, and our understanding of the science that drives these studies. The book is ideal for supply chain managers, analysts, and consultants who must do these studies, for people who work for a company or organization with a supply chain and want to understand the design and strategy better, and for professors who want to bring a practical and intellectually interesting material to the classroom. Our goal is to help you deeply understand this topic. We covers the topics with realistic case studies, discussions of practical consideration, and a mix of the science. This helps you understand the topic, understand how it applies to you, and build your intuition. We hope you enjoy the book!

“This book takes a very technical subject and makes it possible for managers and  students alike to understand all aspects of network design. The practical approach used in discussing topics throughout the book provides a clear and excellent framework for those seeking to learn more about the topic.”
—Dr. Mary C. Holcomb, Department of Marketing and Supply Chain Management, University of Tennessee

“Supply chain management (SCM) is a rapidly growing area of study—and network design is one of the fastest growing areas within SCM. I have been a long-time  practitioner of network modeling, as a manager in business and as a consultant,  and I have covered the topic in university lectures. I still learned a great deal  about a subject I thought I knew thoroughly!”
—Bill Nickle, Principal, Nickle Consulting

 “...the authors draw on their extensive expertise as practitioners to provide valuable  insights into how to successfully execute a network design study.”
—Dr. Mike Hewitt, Kate Gleason College of Engineering, Rochester Institute of Technology

“Supply Chain Network Design will help students, academics, and practitioners alike understand the importance of successfully designing and optimizing a global supply chain network, while also explaining in easy-to-understand steps how to make it happen.”
—John A. Caltagirone, Quinlan School of Business, Loyola University

This book provides a complete foundation for building tomorrow’s most complex global supply chain models and using them to  reduce costs and support business strategy. Drawing on their experience building and optimizing hundreds of supply chains, the authors thoroughly introduce each key  concept and its modern scientific foundations and demonstrate its use through realistic case studies.

The authors offer specific solutions for  a wide range of common challenges, including efficiently expanding a warehouse/plant network, managing the subtle interactions between capacity and service levels, and  leveraging differences in cost and mode between inbound and outbound transportation. They also guide you in nuts-and-bolts planning and data collection and answering real-world questions such as: How do you build an  effective supply chain modeling team? How do you quantify capacity? How accurate does your data need to be? How do you debug models and avoid common mistakes?

Using their techniques, many supply chain practitioners have reduced their costs by 5-15%—translating into tens of millions of dollars of savings. You can achieve comparable results—and this book is the place to start.

Use leading-edge network design techniques to:
·   Select the right number, location, and size of warehouses, plants, and production lines
·   Specify the right territories for each facility
·   Optimize flow of all products through the supply chain
·   Decide what to manufacture internally, where to make these products, which products to outsource, and which  suppliers to use
·   Manage crucial tradeoffs such as cost  versus service level
·   Integrate analytics more effectively throughout supply chain management
·   Optimize regularly for even greater savings

Includes case studies and exercises that can be used  with commercially available software.