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<p class=MsoNormal>Dear College of Engineering Faculty:<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>I am sending the following dissertation defense information
in case any of your graduate students or you are interested in attending it.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><br>
Suresh Khator<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Book Antiqua","serif";
color:blue'>_______________________________________________________</span><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Book Antiqua","serif";
color:blue'>Suresh K. Khator, Ph.D., P.E.
Phone:
713-743-4205 <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Book Antiqua","serif";
color:blue'>Associate Dean, College of Engineering Fax:
713-743-4214<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Book Antiqua","serif";
color:blue'>University of
Houston Email:
skhator@uh.edu <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Book Antiqua","serif";
color:blue'>E421 Engineering Bldg
2 www.egr.uh.edu/ie<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Book Antiqua","serif";
color:blue'>Houston, TX 77204-4008<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>Department of Industrial Engineering<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><u><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>Doctoral Dissertation Presentation<o:p></o:p></span></u></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><u><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'><o:p><span style='text-decoration:none'> </span></o:p></span></u></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>Topic: Optimal Control Policies for Production/Inventory
Systems<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>With Exchange Transactions<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>Doctoral Candidate: Nilesh Ramesh Kulkarni<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>Advisor: Dr. Ali Ekici<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>Date: April 13<sup>th</sup> 2010 Tuesday<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>Time: 9:00 am<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>Place: E 214, Engineering Building 2<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'>Abstract<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><span
style='font-size:14.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-right:9.0pt;text-align:justify;line-height:
120%'>Today's firms face unprecedented challenges due to increasing production
variability, upstream supply disruptions, demand volatility, and recent surges
in the transportation costs. Transshipments among firms supplying substitutable
products can mitigate the impacts of uncertainty and enhance the overall supply
chain efficiency. High-volume, two-way systematic transshipments, known as
exchanges, are common in gas and chemical industries. In this work, we
consider a two location system where systematic exchange transactions are
controlled by a central agent. We model the system as a finite-horizon expected
total cost dynamic program and an infinite-horizon expected total discounted
cost dynamic program and characterize the optimal production/inventory and the
exchange policies for such system. We also extend this model to
incorporate Markov-modulated demand where demand can be positively or
negatively correlated. Using extensive numerical analysis, we present the
sensitivity of our results to different factors such as capacity allocation,
demand allocation, exchange transaction costs, exchange inventory holding costs
and the demand volatility and provide managerial insights on the desirability
of exchange transactions. Additionally, we introduce the generalized framework
for transshipment systems, which accounts for traditional transshipment related
costs, exchange transactions related costs and fixed costs for initiating
transshipments. Finally, we summarize our findings and present several future
research directions that can follow this work. <span style='font-size:12.0pt;
line-height:120%'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-right:9.0pt;text-align:justify;line-height:
120%'><b><o:p> </o:p></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='margin-right:9.0pt;text-align:justify;line-height:
120%'><b>Keywords</b>: Exchange transactions, transshipments, inventory
management, make-to-stock system, Markov Decision Process.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
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