CTL.SC1x - Supply Chain Fundamentals

WEEK 1: SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT - CORE CONCEPTS

This first week will teach the definition and scope of supply chain management. You will also learn about the challenge of uncertainty and become comfortable with the concept of segmentation. 

WEEK 2: FORECASTING I - TIME SERIES ANALYSIS AND EXPONENTIAL SMOOTHING

In Week 2, you will learn the fundamental concepts concerning forecasting and demand planning. You will become familiar with time-series analysis, and, building on this, you will learn the basics of exponential smoothing - perhaps the most commonly used demand forecasting methodology.  You will know how to include both level and trend into your forecasts by the end of the week.

WEEK 3: FORECASTING II - SEASONALITY AND SPECIAL CASES

In this week, you will learn how to include seasonality (that is, a repeating pattern over a year, month, week, day, etc.) into your forecasts.  It will become quickly apparent how exponential smoothing can handle this - and you will see where the complexity increases.  You will also learn about regression and other techniques used for exceptional cases, such as new product forecasting. This week completes the demand forecasting portion of the course.  

WEEK 4: INVENTORY I - TOTAL COST EQUATION AND EOQ

The inventory section opens up with the simplest inventory model: the Economic Order Quantity (EOQ).  The EOQ assumes deterministic and constant demand, and while this seems rather onerous, you will realize that the EOQ model is handy and widely used in practice.  You will learn the basics as well as how to handle exceptional cases, such as discounts, lead times, and finite replenishment

WEEK 5: PREP-WEEK 

Week five is a prep week with no new graded assignments.  It provides you time to complete previous assignments and prepare for the Midterm next week.   

WEEK 6: MIDTERM EXAM

The Midterm exam is a timed exam covering all material presented to date.  The exam will only be available for 72 hours, and once you start it, there is a limited time (4 hours) to complete it.

WEEK 7: INVENTORY II - SINGLE PERIOD INVENTORY MODELS

We now expand from our initial deterministic and constant demand assumptions to allow for stochastic or random demand in inventory replenishment models.  Starting with just a single time period, you will learn to develop models that handle uncertain demand.  You will master what is called the Newsvendor Model.  While seemingly simple, you will see that it is the basis of virtually all more sophisticated inventory models.  

WEEK 8: INVENTORY III - MULTI-PERIOD INVENTORY MODELS AND SPECIAL CASES

This week develops and uses the most common inventory policies in practice for both continuous (s,Q) and periodic (R,S) review situations.  You will learn how to formulate models that either minimize costs or meet a specified level of service.  You will also learn how service and costs relate to each other.  We will wrap up this section by showing some methods to apply these inventory models for multiple items and multiple locations simultaneously.  You will learn how segmentation can differentiate how inventory is managed in different situations. 

WEEK 9: TRANSPORTATION I: FUNDAMENTALS OF FREIGHT TRANSPORTATION

This week you will focus on understanding the fundamentals of freight transportation from a global perspective.  You will learn how to make routing decisions with multiple legs and demonstrate how this applies to any mode selection. You will also learn how to handle uncertainty in lead times and see how this relates to inventory policies. 

WEEK 10: TRANSPORTATION II - FREIGHT TRANSPORTATION ANALYSIS AND COURSE WRAP UP

This week we will dive deeper into freight transportation by exploring three different transportation problems: one-to-one, one-to-many and many-to-many. We will also wrap up the course by connecting forecasting, inventory management, and transportation with a case study.

WEEK 11: PREP-WEEK

Again, this is a prep week with no new graded assignments so that you can get prepared for the Final Exam.

WEEK 12: FINAL EXAM

The Final exam is a timed exam that covers all the material in the course.  The exam will only be available for 72 hours, and once you start it, there is a limited time (4 hours) to complete it.