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Nikos Trichakis and Kamal Youcef-Toumi. Goh, Nigel(Nigel Goh Min Feng) Sloan School of Management. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering. Leaders for Global Operations Program. Sloan School of Management Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering Leaders for Global Operations Program 2020-09-03T16:44:53Z 2020-09-03T16:44:53Z 2020 2020 https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/126955 1191622819 Thesis: M.B.A., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, in conjunction with the Leaders for Global Operations Program at MIT, May, 2020 Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Mechanical Engineering, in conjunction with the Leaders for Global Operations Program at MIT, May, 2020 Cataloged from the official PDF of thesis. Includes bibliographical references (pages 85-86). Amazon is able to deliver millions of packages to customers every day through its Fulfillment Center (FC) network that is powered by miles of material handling equipment (MHE) such as conveyor belts. Unfortunately, this reliance on MHE means that failures could cripple an entire FC. The exceptionally high stock-out cost associated with equipment failure means spare parts must always available when required. This is made difficult as Amazon does not hold any central repository of inventory at present - all inventory is held at a site-level. Unfortunately, FCs have to stock more inventory than required due to unpredictable failures, long lead times from suppliers, and no standard work processes for site-to-site transfers. However, if Amazon is able to pool its spares across multiple FCs, it has an opportunity to reduce the spares kept across the entire FC network, position itself to better respond to catastrophic failures, and consolidate interfaces with suppliers. The goal of this thesis is to identify the inventory model and network design that would maximize parts availability while minimizing cost. Additionally, an implementation roadmap will be developed to outline how such a system (e.g. hub locations, logistic channels etc.) can be developed. This thesis concludes by proposing potential extensions of the work conducted in this thesis to improve the practicality and financial impact of the proposed network and inventory model. by Nigel Goh Min Feng. M.B.A. S.M. M.B.A. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Mechanical Engineering 86 pages eng Massachusetts Institute of Technology MIT theses may be protected by copyright. Please reuse MIT thesis content according to the MIT Libraries Permissions Policy, which is available through the URL provided. http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582 Sloan School of Management. Mechanical Engineering. Leaders for Global Operations Program. Applications of risk pooling for the optimization of spare parts with stochastic demand within large scale networks Thesis application/pdf 2020-09-03T16:44:53Z Publication Master Sloan MechE unknown unknown <Publication xmlns="https://www.openaire.eu/cerif-profile/1.1/" id="a00edcad-6cae-45b4-92a7-6b2cd850601f"> <Type xmlns="https://www.openaire.eu/cerif-profile/vocab/COAR_Publication_Types">http://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_1843</Type> <Language>eng</Language> <Title>Applications of risk pooling for the optimization of spare parts with stochastic demand within large scale networks</Title> <PublishedIn> <Publication> </Publication> </PublishedIn> <PublicationDate>2020</PublicationDate> <Authors> <Author> <DisplayName>Goh, Nigel(Nigel Goh Min Feng)</DisplayName> <Affiliation> <OrgUnit> </OrgUnit> </Affiliation> </Author> </Authors> <Editors> </Editors> <Publishers> <Publisher> <DisplayName>Massachusetts Institute of Technology</DisplayName> <OrgUnit /> </Publisher> </Publishers> <License>http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582</License> <Keyword>Sloan School of Management.</Keyword> <Keyword>Mechanical Engineering.</Keyword> <Keyword>Leaders for Global Operations Program.</Keyword> <Abstract>Amazon is able to deliver millions of packages to customers every day through its Fulfillment Center (FC) network that is powered by miles of material handling equipment (MHE) such as conveyor belts. Unfortunately, this reliance on MHE means that failures could cripple an entire FC. The exceptionally high stock-out cost associated with equipment failure means spare parts must always available when required. This is made difficult as Amazon does not hold any central repository of inventory at present - all inventory is held at a site-level. Unfortunately, FCs have to stock more inventory than required due to unpredictable failures, long lead times from suppliers, and no standard work processes for site-to-site transfers. However, if Amazon is able to pool its spares across multiple FCs, it has an opportunity to reduce the spares kept across the entire FC network, position itself to better respond to catastrophic failures, and consolidate interfaces with suppliers. The goal of this thesis is to identify the inventory model and network design that would maximize parts availability while minimizing cost. Additionally, an implementation roadmap will be developed to outline how such a system (e.g. hub locations, logistic channels etc.) can be developed. This thesis concludes by proposing potential extensions of the work conducted in this thesis to improve the practicality and financial impact of the proposed network and inventory model.</Abstract> <Access xmlns="http://purl.org/coar/access_right" > </Access> </Publication>