Panels
Registration Link: https://www.xcdsystem.com/IEOM/attendee/index.cfm?ID=FmpG68d
Women in Industry and Academia (WIIA) Panel sponsored by Ford Motor Company
2:00 – 3:30 pm, July 2, 2025
Panel Co-Chairs
Sagit Kedem-Yemini
Logistics Department
Sapir Academic College
Sderot, Israel
Sagit Kedem-Yemini is an Industrial Engineer, proficient in information systems and currently holding two lecturing positions: a tenured lecturer position at Sapir Academic College (Logistics Department) and an adjunct lecturer at Ben Gurion University (both in IE&M and Faculty of Business and Management). Her teaching portfolio is broad, focusing on Enterprise Systems implementation (SAP and Oracle Applications) and derivatives of ERP data collection – from Business Analytics to Process Mining. Additionally, she has extensive experience in academic curriculum development, is head of her department’s teaching committee and serves as liaison to the graduation projects unit. Her research interests include Process Mining and its practical applications, ERP relates issues and DSS development. Since 2015 Dr. Kedem-Yemini serves as member of JITCAR Editorial Review Board, and since 2019 is a faculty advisor of the Student Chapter of the IEOM Society at Sapir Academic College. Prior to her academic career, Dr. Kedem-Yemini worked at a global Clean-Room Fab Build-Up Construction Management Company with major clients (such as Intel, Tower Semiconductors, and Teva Pharmaceuticals), where she held various positions, including Logistics Manager, Scheduling Manager and CIO (Chief Information Officer).
Dr. Anjali Awasthi
Professor, CIISE
Concordia University
Montreal, Canada
Past President, Canadian Operations Research Society
Dr. Anjali Awasthi is Full Professor at Concordia Institute for Information Systems Engineering (CIISE), in Concordia University, Montreal. She is currently serving as the President for CORS (Canadian Operations Research Society). In the past, she has served as Concordia University Research Chair (Tier-II) in Connected Sustainable Mobility Systems, CORS in the role of Vice-President, Education Chair, and jury member of student competitions. She is a senior member of ASQ (American Society for Quality), associate of LSRC (Loyola Sustainability Research Center), and regular member of CIRRELT (Centre Interuniversitaire de Recherche sur les Reseaux d’Entreprise, la Logistique et le Transport). She is also the recipient of Eldon Gunn service award (CORS 2018, Halifax) and IEOM Special Recognition Award (4th North American Conference on Industrial Engineering and Operations Management, Toronto, 2019). Her research paper entitled “A system dynamics simulation model to evaluate regulatory policies for sustainable transportation planning” received the best paper award from Taylor and Francis journal “International Journal of Modeling and Simulation”. She is also a member of CORS Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) committee and promotor of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math). She received her PhD in industrial engineering and automation from INRIA Rocquencourt and University of Metz, France and a Masters in Industrial and Management Engineering from IIT Kanpur, India. Prior to Concordia, Dr. Awasthi worked at University of British Columbia and University of Laval where she was involved in several projects on industrial applications of operations research. In France, she worked on many European research projects aimed at improving urban mobility in cities, city logistics and on cybernetic transportation systems. She has appeared on Radio Canada, CTV, Montreal Gazette, Le Devoir, The suburban, Metro and The Globe and The Mail.
Professor Awasthi’s research interests lie in modeling and simulation, data mining, Information Technology and decision making, sustainable logistics planning, quality assurance in supply chain management and sustainable supply chain management. she is particularly interested in investigating how the new digital technologies are shaping our everyday decision making process. Other key problems include how our cities can be relieved of ongoing traffic congestion, how should the sustainability policies be devised for improved mobility of goods and people, how to perform stakeholder collaboration planning, how to benchmark sustainability performance of organizations, and how autonomous vehicles can be brough mainstream to complement our transportation ecosystem. She is also interested in industrial applications of OR (Operations Research), and has published extensively in the area.
Panel Speaker I
Luz María Valdez de la Rosa, Ph.D.
Profesora del Departamento de Ingeniería Civil y Gestión
Escuela de Ingeniería y Tecnologías
Universidad de Monterrey
Monterrey, NL, Mexico
Luz María Valdez de la Rosa is an Associate Professor at the University of Monterrey, located in the state of Nuevo León, México. She holds a B.S. In Industrial and Systems Engineering and a Master ‘s degree in Quality Management, both from the University of Monterrey. She also earned a Ph.D. in Administrative Sciences from the Autonomous University of Nuevo León.
Dr. Valdez de la Rosa has over 25 years of professional experience in the field of quality and more than 20 years of experience in higher education. She has worked as a consultant for both manufacturing and service sectors in areas related to quality management. She is an active member of professional organization the American Society for Quality (ASQ). She is also a Fellow and Global Council member of the Industrial Engineering and Operations Management (IEOM) Society.
Panel Speaker II
Dr. Xuan (Jen) Zhao
Professor in Operations and Decision Sciences
Lazaridis School of Business and Economics
Wilfrid Laurier University
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
Dr. Zhao is a professor in Operations and Decision Sciences at Lazaridis School of Business and Economics at Wilfrid Laurier University. She holds a Ph.D. in the joint fields of Management Science and Transportation/Logistics from the University of British Columbia. Her research involves utilizing the tools of Management Science/Operations Research and Economics to model, analyze, and derive insights into problems in the areas of Supply Chain Management, Marketing/OM interfaces, Revenue Management, Entrepreneurships, Sustainable Operations, Behavior Operations, and Business Analytics. Her research papers appear in prestigious refereed journals in operations such as Manufacturing & Service Operations Management (FT top 50), Production and Operations management (FT top 50), European Journal of Operational Research, Transportation Research Part E, Naval Research Logistics, as well as marketing journals such as Quantitative Marketing and Economics, Journal of Marketing and Consumer Research.
Dr. Zhao’s research has been recognized and supported by National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canda, as well as multiple provincial and international grants. Research funds (total of $1.5 million) enable her to supervise numerous post-doctoral fellows, doctoral students, and master’s students. Dr. Zhao has also won numerous awards and scholarships, including the Inaugural Lazaridis Research Excellent Award, Ministry of Research Innovation post-doctoral supervision award, High-Caliber Foreign Expert of Liaoning Province China, numerous faculty merit awards and course remission awards, Canadian Administrative Science Best Paper Award, Wiley top-cited paper award.
Beyond services within Laurier, Dr. Zhao has served in NSERC Discovery Grant Committee, SSHRC Insight Development Grant Committee, inaugural NSERC Horizon program committee, as a university examiner of Lingnan University in Hong Kong, an Associate Editor of Journal of Operational Research Society, and on editorial review board of Production and Operations Management, Adjunct Professor at the University of Waterloo.
Panel Speaker III
Zhe Yuan
Associate Professor
EMLV Business School
Paris, France
Zhe Yuan is an Associate Professor at EMLV Business School. She holds her Ph.D. in Industrial Sciences and Technologies from Centrale Supélec, Université Paris-Saclay. She serves as a project coordinator for the European Union’s ERASMUS+ programs, specifically focusing on the creation of pedagogical material for the 21st Century (TASK21) in the areas of EdTech and AI. Her research interests include Operations Management, Robotic Warehousing, AI-driven Decision-making in Management Sciences, Energy and Environmental Efficiency, and Data Envelopment Analysis. She has published articles in influential journals such as European Journal of Operational Research, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, International Journal of Production Economics, International Journal of Production Research, Journal of the Operational Research Society, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, Transportation Research (Part D and E), and Energy Economics.
Panel Speaker IV
Dr Carman Ka Man
Associate professor
Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Hong Kong, PRC
Dr Carman Ka Man LEE is currently an associate professor in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong. She is the lab-in-charge of Cyber Physical Systems Laboratory and scheme leader of Intelligent Supply chain and Engineering Management. She has authored or co-authored more than 200 journal papers including IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics, IEEE Transactions of Systems, Man and Cybernetics, International Journal of Production Economics, and International Journal of Production Research. Her current research areas include logistics information management, Industry 4.0, Internet of things and data analytics techniques. She is the senior editor of Industrial Management and Data Systems and associate editor of IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics and serve as Guest editors of several journals such as Advanced Engineering Informatics, IEEE sensors, and Engineering Design.
Meet the Editors Panel I
4:00 – 5:30 pm, July 2, 2025
Co-Chairs: Dr Carman Ka Man and Dr. Laoucine Kerbache
Dr. Jianxin (Roger) Jiao
Associate Professor of Enterprise Systems Engineering
G,W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
Atlanta, GA, USA
Dr. Jiao joined the Woodruff School in December 2008. Prior, he was an Assistant Professor and then Associate Professor in the School of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Before his career in Singapore, he was a Visiting Scholar in the Department of Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology from 1998 to 1999. From 1993 to 1994, he was a Lecturer of Industrial Engineering in the School of Management at Tianjin University, China, and from 1988 to 1990, he worked as an Associate Lecturer in the Department of Industrial Design at Tianjin University of Science and Technology, China.
Dr. Jiao’s research activities are geared toward a good leverage of practical relevance and academic rigor. He is interested in a number of investigations related to an extended enterprise, involving engineering design and product development (design theory and methodology, product family and product platform, customer requirement management, affective design and Kansei engineering, design project management, service modeling and service delivery system design), enterprise engineering and industrial systems (reconfigurable manufacturing systems, production planning and control, supply chain management and engineering logistics, system modeling and simulation, sales/marketing manufacturing interface, global manufacturing and operations, mass customization), as well as manufacturing and management information systems (artificial intelligence in design and manufacturing, industrial applications of e-commerce, virtual enterprise).
His research is motivated by the current trend of manufacturing companies to move toward global manufacturing in order to better leverage capabilities and resources worldwide. Product realization then becomes globally distributed and necessitates collaboration that transcends geographic boundaries. Strategic engineering with a focus on product creation suggests itself to be of primary importance for companies to gain competitive edges. Product design has to address individual customer needs along with diverse market niches, while maintaining low costs and near mass production efficiency. Build-to-order and reconfiguration have become common norms. The traditional spectrum of product fulfillment therefore must be expended to encompass marketing, design, production, as well as supply and value chains; and must be aligned with the self-adaptability of a learning organization. Dr. Jiao’s vision is that the product creation horizon will be shifted from a physical product perspective to a total life cycle experience. Product creation should be more than just dealing with pieces of hardware, but rather should be enacted as the co-design of an entire ecosystem, including fulfillment, services, experiences and human satisfaction at the individual and the community levels.
Education
- Ph.D. (Industrial Engineering), Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, 1998
- M.E. (Intelligent Manufacturing), Tianjin University, China, 1993
- B.E. (Mechanical Design), Tianjin University of Science and Technology, China, 1988
Prof. George Q. Huang
Chair Professor of Smart Manufacturing
Director of Research Institute for Advanced Manufacturing
Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Hung Hom, Kowloon
Hong Kong
George joined Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University in December 2022 as Chair Professor of Smart Manufacturing. Prior to this appointment, he was Chair Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering and Head of Department in Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering at The University of Hong Kong. He gained BEng and PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Southeast University (China) and Cardiff University (UK) respectively. He has conducted research projects in areas of Smart Manufacturing, Logistics, and Construction through IoT-enabled Cyber-Physical Internet and Systems Analytics. His research has been supported with substantial government and industrial grants. He has directed a strong research team and collaborated closely with leading academic and industrial organizations through joint projects and start-up companies. He has published extensively and his works have been highly cited by research communities. He serves as associate editors and editorial members for several international journals. He is Chartered Engineer (CEng), Fellow of IEEE, IISE, ASME, HKIE, IET and CILT.
Dr. Maged M. Dessouky
Dean’s Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering
Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering and Spatial Sciences Institute
Department Chair, Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering
USC Viterbi School of Engineering
University of Southern California
Los Angles, California, USA
Dr. Dessouky received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in Industrial Engineering from Purdue University in 1984 and 1987, respectively. He obtained his Ph.D. degree in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from the University of California at Berkeley in 1992.
His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, Society of Manufacturing Engineers, PATH, Caltrans, FTA, and Department of Defense. He was recipient of the 2007 Transportation Science & Logistics Best Paper Prize (“Optimal Slack Time for Schedule-Based Transit Operations”). He is a Fellow of the Institute of Industrial Engineers. Dr. Dessouky was a recipient of IIE Operations Research Division Excellence in Teaching Award, the USC Associates Award in Teaching (Top University Award for Teaching), Alpha Pi Mu/Omega Rho Outstanding Teacher of the Year in Industrial Systems Engineering, the USC Award for Excellence in Teaching, and the TRW School of Engineering Teacher Award. He is area/associate editor of Computers & Industrial Engineering, IIE Transactions, and Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, on the editorial board of Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, and previously served as Area Editor of ACM Transactions of Modelling and Computer Simulation and IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems.
Dr. Min Xie
Chair Professor, Department of Systems Engineering
Chair Professor, Affiliate, Department of Data Science
City University of Hong Kong
Tat Chee Avenue, Kowloon, Hong Kong, PRC
Fellow of IEEE (2006)
Elected Member of Int Statistical Institute (2010)
Member of European Academy of Sciences and Arts (2022)
Asian Region VP of Inst of Industrial and Systems Engineers (2022-2024)
M. Xie completed his undergraduate studies in Sweden, earning a direct MSc from the Royal Institute of Technology in 1984, followed by a PhD from Linköping University in 1987. In 1991, he joined the National University of Singapore (NUS) as one of the first recipients of the prestigious Lee Kuan Yew Research Fellowship, later becoming a full professor in 2005. In May 2011, Professor Xie moved to the City University of Hong Kong (CityU), as Chair Professor of Industrial Engineering. He has conducted extensive research in industrial engineering, focusing on reliability engineering and quality management, and has published over 300 journal articles and authored 10 books. At NUS and CityU, Prof Xie supervised more than 70 PhD students, now holding positions in industry and academia across various continents. Prof Xie has also served as editor, associate editor, or on editorial board member for over 10 leading international journals. Prof Xie was elected a Fellow of the IEEE in 2005 and elected to the European Academy of Sciences and Arts. He currently serves as Chairman of Fellow Evaluation Committee for IEEE TEMS society and VP for Asian Region of IISE.
Dr Carman Ka Man
Associate professor
Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Hong Kong, PRC
Dr Carman Ka Man LEE is currently an associate professor in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong. She is the lab-in-charge of Cyber Physical Systems Laboratory and scheme leader of Intelligent Supply chain and Engineering Management. She has authored or co-authored more than 200 journal papers including IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics, IEEE Transactions of Systems, Man and Cybernetics, International Journal of Production Economics, and International Journal of Production Research. Her current research areas include logistics information management, Industry 4.0, Internet of things and data analytics techniques. She is the senior editor of Industrial Management and Data Systems and associate editor of IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics and serve as Guest editors of several journals such as Advanced Engineering Informatics, IEEE sensors, and Engineering Design.
Dr. Laoucine Kerbache
Professor
Head of Engineering Management & Decision Sciences Division
College of Science and Engineering
Hamad Bin Khalifa University
Doha, Qatar
Dr. Laoucine Kerbache is Professor of logistics and supply chain management and a founding member (and currently head) of the Engineering Management and Decisions Science division in the College of Science and Engineering at Hamad Bin Khalifa University. He is also HEC Paris Emeritus Professor. He holds a PhD, an MSc, and a BSc degree in industrial engineering and operations research from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. His research areas span interfaces of industrial engineering, operations research, operations management, logistics, and supply chain management and analytics with a special focus on modeling and optimization of problems related to industrial facilities and service organizations. Over the last 35 years, Dr. Kerbache has been in academia for 25 years at HEC Paris where he was Professor of operations management, logistics, and supply chain management. He also held various academic and managerial positions including Associate Dean in charge of the PhD Program in the Paris campus, and Dean and CEO of HEC Paris in Qatar. He has been very active in research and has published over 150 publications in top-tier international journals and a significant number of academic textbooks. In addition, he supervised numerous theses and dissertations in various international institutions. He is an active member of numerous academic and research professional organizations such as INFORMS, POMS, MSOM, IEEE, EUROMA, IEOM, etc.
Panel on Global Supply Chain and Logistics
2:00 – 3:30 pm, July 3, 2025
Panel Chair
Pervaiz Akhtar, PhD, MSc, MBA, BSc, PCAP & HE UK Senior Fellow
Chair (Full Professor) in Business Analytics, Big Data & Supply Chains
Director of MBA Programmes
University of Aberdeen
Aberdeen, UK
Pervaiz Akhtar is Director of the MBA suite of programmes and Chair (Full Professor) in Business Analytics, Big Data and Supply Chains. Professor Akhtar utilises mixed methods and modelling to optimize and de-risk operational performance, supply chains and business value. He was Associate Dean of Graduate Studies before joining the University of Aberdeen. He has been a Visiting Professor of Big Data and Business Analytics/Management Science (e.g., IESSEG, France) and a member of Executive Groups. He is also associated with Imperial College London, as his philosophy of continuous learning.
Due to his all-round excellence in leadership, research and teaching, he is one of only 155 academics across all disciplines in the UK who earned their Professorship under the age of 35 as per HE records and became the youngest professor from his country of origin (out of over 212 million population). He has also set consecutive promotion records.
Professor Akhtar has capitalised on over 20 years of academic, consulting and industrial experiences from the UK, France, New Zealand and other countries – played leading roles in teaching and research. By integrating informatics, analytics and big data applications in undergraduate and postgraduate programmes, Professor Akhtar serves to bridge the gap between academic practices and industrial requirements. He has played multiple senior management roles in industry and worked with private and non-profit-making organizations such as UNICEF, JCCP, Oxfam, MSF, Islamic Relief, Red Cross, Unilever and Reckitt Benckiser.
Along with his intriguing interdisciplinary education (BSc in Double Major Mathematics and Statistics, MBA, MSc in Logistics and Supply Chains, PCAP, Senior UKHE Fellowship, PhD in Supply Chain and Operations Management with extensive Data Science Applications), his research has appeared in top-ranked journals (i.e., A*/FT50/CABS4/Q1) spanning a range of domains and industries including food, healthcare, FMCG, manufacturing, humanitarian operations, performance measurement, business value creation, logistics, supply chains, technology, big data analytics and data science skills.
He has extensive experience of supervising UG, PG and PhD students and warmly welcomes all students. PhD students are particularly encouraged to apply in his area of interest such as big data, blockchain technology, analytics, humanitarian logistics and business operations.
Professor Akhtar has worked on multiple projects with more than 20 companies and organizations worldwide (e.g., United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, Malaysia, Pakistan and Europe). He has completed more than 10 funded projects and received awards – the value more than £5 million.
Panel Speaker I
Dr. Mira Chitt
Head of Mechanical Engineering Department and Engineering Management
Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering
Global College of Engineering and Technology
Muscat, Oman
Dr. Mira serves as the Head of the Mechanical Engineering Department at Global College of Engineering and Technology, Oman in affiliation with the University of West England. She is also the program leader of MSc Engineering Management and an Associate Professor in Mechanical Engineering and Logistics and Supply Chain Management.
Dr Mira is an accomplished academic professional with over a decade of international experience in industry and education. Dr. Mira is deeply committed to upholding the highest standards of excellence in academic matters. Her main research interests are in Fluid Mechanics, Logistics, and Engineering Management. Dr Mira earned her PhD from Paris-Saclay University, France.
Panel Speaker II
Dr. Guoqing Zhang
Professor
Department of Mechanical, Automotive and Materials Engineering
Faculty of Engineering
University of Windsor
Windsor, Canada
Guoqing Zhang, is a Professor in the Faculty of Engineering, University of Windsor, and also the director of Supply Chain and Logistics Optimization Research Centre. He received his Ph.D. degree in Management Sciences from City University of Hong Kong in 2000. His recent research interests include optimization in supply chain management, logistics, algorithms design and development, RFID, and facility/warehouse layout. He has published articles on those areas in journals such as Computational Optimization and Applications, IIE Transactions, European Journal of Operational Research, Computers and Operations Research, and Operations Research. He has served as a consultant to Auto, Energy, and Foods industries.
Panel Speaker III
Dr. Petri Helo
Professor of Industrial Management, Logistics Systems
Head of Networked Value Systems Research Group
School of Technology and Innovations
University of Vaasa
Finland
Petri Helo is Professor of Industrial Management, Logistics Systems and the head of Networked Value Systems research group, at School of Technology and Innovations, University of Vaasa, Finland. His research addresses the management of supply demand networks and use of information technology in operations. Prof. Helo is also partner and board member at Wapice Ltd, a software solution provider of CPQ and IoT solutions.
Panel Speaker IV
Surajit Bag, PhD
Full Professor
Department of Supply Chain, Purchasing and Project Management
CERIIM – Centre de Recherche en Intelligence et Innovation Managériales
La Rochelle Cedex 1, France
Surajit Bag is a Full Professor of Supply Chain Management at Excelia Business School. He has teaching experience across France, Morocco, India, and South Africa. Before transitioning to academia, Dr. Bag accrued eleven years of industry experience, holding senior roles in distinguished manufacturing companies. Dr. Bag earned his Ph.D. in Operations Management from the prestigious Postgraduate School of Engineering Management at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa.
His research achievements are recognized in high-impact journals, including FNEGE-1-ranked publications. His research focuses primarily on Supply Chain Sustainability, a field in which his work has garnered over 10,000 citations, according to Google Scholar. Dr. Bag’s scholarly impact was acknowledged with the prestigious “AIMS-IRMA Young Management Researcher Award” in 2016. Further, he has been included in the “World’s Top 2% Scientists” list, released in 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024, and was recognized in Research.com’s 2024 ranking of the top business and management scientists in France. Additionally, Dr. Bag serves as an AE for several leading journals and has curated special issues for a variety of academic publications. Dr. Bag has successfully supervised five MPhil students at the University of Johannesburg, guiding them through dissertation completion and publication in reputable journals. He also co-supervises PhD students from India, South Africa, and New Zealand. He has evaluated twelve PhD and DBA theses from India, South Africa and France.
Ph.D. Workshop
4:00 – 5:30 pm, July 3, 2025
Chair
Professor Linda Zhang
Full Professor of Operations Management
Department of Management
IESEG School of Management
Paris, France
Linda L. ZHANG is currently a Professor of Operations Management in Department of Operations Management at IESEG School of Management (LEM-CNRS 9221), Lille-Paris, France. She obtained her BEng and Ph.D. degrees in Industrial Engineering in 1998 and 2007, respectively. Her research interests include sustainable supply chain and operations management, product and production configuration, financial management, etc. On these areas, she has published many articles in international refereed journals, such as Decision Support Systems, IIE Transactions, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, European Journal of Operations Research, International Journal of Production Economics, International Journal of Production Research, etc. She serves as an associate editor for several peer-reviewed international journals, such as Decision Analytics Journal, Supply Chain Analytics, and Journal of Engineering Design. Professor Zhang has obtained many paper awards from different peer-reviewed journals and international conferences. She has been elected as a Fellow of the IEOM Society International.
Dr. Roel Leus
Professor of Operations Research
KU Leuven
Leuven, Belgium
Roel Leus obtained his PhD in Operations Research (OR) from KU Leuven (Belgium) in 2003, and is currently full professor of OR at the Faculty of Economics and Business of the same university. He is also the program director of the Business Engineering programs (for all campuses, covering around 2000 students), and the chairman of the university-wide Advisory Committee for the Chinese Region of KU Leuven. He was the head of the research group ORSTAT (Operations Research and Statistics) from 2012 to 2016. His main research interests are in sequencing and scheduling, combinatorial optimization, and decision making under uncertainty. Roel Leus has published over 80 papers in international journals such as Production and Operations Management, Journal of Operations Management, INFORMS Journal on Computing, Transportation Science, IIE Transactions, and European Journal of Operational Research. Prof. Roel Leus is currently also associate editor of the journal OR Spectrum, and special-issue editor of Annals of Operations Research and of Transportation Research Part E.
Dr. Jianxin (Roger) Jiao
Associate Professor of Enterprise Systems Engineering
G,W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
Atlanta, GA, USA
Dr. Jiao joined the Woodruff School in December 2008. Prior, he was an Assistant Professor and then Associate Professor in the School of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Before his career in Singapore, he was a Visiting Scholar in the Department of Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology from 1998 to 1999. From 1993 to 1994, he was a Lecturer of Industrial Engineering in the School of Management at Tianjin University, China, and from 1988 to 1990, he worked as an Associate Lecturer in the Department of Industrial Design at Tianjin University of Science and Technology, China.
Dr. Jiao’s research activities are geared toward a good leverage of practical relevance and academic rigor. He is interested in a number of investigations related to an extended enterprise, involving engineering design and product development (design theory and methodology, product family and product platform, customer requirement management, affective design and Kansei engineering, design project management, service modeling and service delivery system design), enterprise engineering and industrial systems (reconfigurable manufacturing systems, production planning and control, supply chain management and engineering logistics, system modeling and simulation, sales/marketing manufacturing interface, global manufacturing and operations, mass customization), as well as manufacturing and management information systems (artificial intelligence in design and manufacturing, industrial applications of e-commerce, virtual enterprise).
His research is motivated by the current trend of manufacturing companies to move toward global manufacturing in order to better leverage capabilities and resources worldwide. Product realization then becomes globally distributed and necessitates collaboration that transcends geographic boundaries. Strategic engineering with a focus on product creation suggests itself to be of primary importance for companies to gain competitive edges. Product design has to address individual customer needs along with diverse market niches, while maintaining low costs and near mass production efficiency. Build-to-order and reconfiguration have become common norms. The traditional spectrum of product fulfillment therefore must be expended to encompass marketing, design, production, as well as supply and value chains; and must be aligned with the self-adaptability of a learning organization. Dr. Jiao’s vision is that the product creation horizon will be shifted from a physical product perspective to a total life cycle experience. Product creation should be more than just dealing with pieces of hardware, but rather should be enacted as the co-design of an entire ecosystem, including fulfillment, services, experiences and human satisfaction at the individual and the community levels.
Education
- Ph.D. (Industrial Engineering), Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, 1998
- M.E. (Intelligent Manufacturing), Tianjin University, China, 1993
- B.E. (Mechanical Design), Tianjin University of Science and Technology, China, 1988
Dr. Petri Helo
Professor of Industrial Management, Logistics Systems
Head of Networked Value Systems Research Group
School of Technology and Innovations
University of Vaasa
Finland
Petri Helo is Professor of Industrial Management, Logistics Systems and the head of Networked Value Systems research group, at School of Technology and Innovations, University of Vaasa, Finland. His research addresses the management of supply demand networks and use of information technology in operations. Prof. Helo is also partner and board member at Wapice Ltd, a software solution provider of CPQ and IoT solutions.
Prof. George Q. Huang
Chair Professor of Smart Manufacturing
Director of Research Institute for Advanced Manufacturing
Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Hung Hom, Kowloon
Hong Kong
George joined Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University in December 2022 as Chair Professor of Smart Manufacturing. Prior to this appointment, he was Chair Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering and Head of Department in Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering at The University of Hong Kong. He gained BEng and PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Southeast University (China) and Cardiff University (UK) respectively. He has conducted research projects in areas of Smart Manufacturing, Logistics, and Construction through IoT-enabled Cyber-Physical Internet and Systems Analytics. His research has been supported with substantial government and industrial grants. He has directed a strong research team and collaborated closely with leading academic and industrial organizations through joint projects and start-up companies. He has published extensively and his works have been highly cited by research communities. He serves as associate editors and editorial members for several international journals. He is Chartered Engineer (CEng), Fellow of IEEE, IISE, ASME, HKIE, IET and CILT.
AI in Manufacturing Panel
2:00 – 3:30 pm, July 4, 2025
Panel Chair
Dr. Mira Chitt
Head of Mechanical Engineering Department and Engineering Management
Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering
Global College of Engineering and Technology
Muscat, Oman
Dr. Mira serves as the Head of the Mechanical Engineering Department at Global College of Engineering and Technology, Oman in affiliation with the University of West England. She is also the program leader of MSc Engineering Management and an Associate Professor in Mechanical Engineering and Logistics and Supply Chain Management.
Dr Mira is an accomplished academic professional with over a decade of international experience in industry and education. Dr. Mira is deeply committed to upholding the highest standards of excellence in academic matters. Her main research interests are in Fluid Mechanics, Logistics, and Engineering Management. Dr Mira earned her PhD from Paris-Saclay University, France.
Panel Speaker I
Prof. George Q. Huang
Chair Professor of Smart Manufacturing
Director of Research Institute for Advanced Manufacturing
Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Hung Hom, Kowloon
Hong Kong
George joined Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University in December 2022 as Chair Professor of Smart Manufacturing. Prior to this appointment, he was Chair Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering and Head of Department in Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering at The University of Hong Kong. He gained BEng and PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Southeast University (China) and Cardiff University (UK) respectively. He has conducted research projects in areas of Smart Manufacturing, Logistics, and Construction through IoT-enabled Cyber-Physical Internet and Systems Analytics. His research has been supported with substantial government and industrial grants. He has directed a strong research team and collaborated closely with leading academic and industrial organizations through joint projects and start-up companies. He has published extensively and his works have been highly cited by research communities. He serves as associate editors and editorial members for several international journals. He is Chartered Engineer (CEng), Fellow of IEEE, IISE, ASME, HKIE, IET and CILT.
Panel Speaker II
Dr. Jianxin (Roger) Jiao
Associate Professor of Enterprise Systems Engineering
G,W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
Atlanta, GA, USA
Dr. Jiao joined the Woodruff School in December 2008. Prior, he was an Assistant Professor and then Associate Professor in the School of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Before his career in Singapore, he was a Visiting Scholar in the Department of Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology from 1998 to 1999. From 1993 to 1994, he was a Lecturer of Industrial Engineering in the School of Management at Tianjin University, China, and from 1988 to 1990, he worked as an Associate Lecturer in the Department of Industrial Design at Tianjin University of Science and Technology, China.
Dr. Jiao’s research activities are geared toward a good leverage of practical relevance and academic rigor. He is interested in a number of investigations related to an extended enterprise, involving engineering design and product development (design theory and methodology, product family and product platform, customer requirement management, affective design and Kansei engineering, design project management, service modeling and service delivery system design), enterprise engineering and industrial systems (reconfigurable manufacturing systems, production planning and control, supply chain management and engineering logistics, system modeling and simulation, sales/marketing manufacturing interface, global manufacturing and operations, mass customization), as well as manufacturing and management information systems (artificial intelligence in design and manufacturing, industrial applications of e-commerce, virtual enterprise).
His research is motivated by the current trend of manufacturing companies to move toward global manufacturing in order to better leverage capabilities and resources worldwide. Product realization then becomes globally distributed and necessitates collaboration that transcends geographic boundaries. Strategic engineering with a focus on product creation suggests itself to be of primary importance for companies to gain competitive edges. Product design has to address individual customer needs along with diverse market niches, while maintaining low costs and near mass production efficiency. Build-to-order and reconfiguration have become common norms. The traditional spectrum of product fulfillment therefore must be expended to encompass marketing, design, production, as well as supply and value chains; and must be aligned with the self-adaptability of a learning organization. Dr. Jiao’s vision is that the product creation horizon will be shifted from a physical product perspective to a total life cycle experience. Product creation should be more than just dealing with pieces of hardware, but rather should be enacted as the co-design of an entire ecosystem, including fulfillment, services, experiences and human satisfaction at the individual and the community levels.
Education
- Ph.D. (Industrial Engineering), Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, 1998
- M.E. (Intelligent Manufacturing), Tianjin University, China, 1993
- B.E. (Mechanical Design), Tianjin University of Science and Technology, China, 1988
Panel Speaker III
Alexandre Dolgui, Dr.habil., Ph.D., IISE Fellow
Professor and Head
Automation, Production and Computer Sciences Dept.
IMT Atlantique, LS2N-CNRS
La Chantrerie, 4, rue Alfred Kastler – B.P. 20722
F-44307 NANTES Cedex 3, France
Editor-in-Chief, International Journal of Production Research (IJPR)
Dr. Alexandre Dolgui is an IISE Fellow, Distinguished Professor and the Head of Automation, Production and Computer Sciences Department at the IMT Atlantique, France. His research focuses on manufacturing line design, production planning and supply chain optimization. His main results are based on the exact mathematical programming methods and their intelligent coupling with heuristics and metaheuristics algorithms. He is the co-author of 5 books, the co-editor of 25 books or conference proceedings, the author of 270 refereed journal papers, 4 prefaces of books, 31 editorials and 37 book chapters as well as over 400 papers in conference proceedings. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Production Research, an Area Editor of Computers & Industrial Engineering, past Associate Editor of International Journal of Systems Science (2005-2008), IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics (2006-2009) and Omega-the International Journal of Management Science (2009-2012), consulting Editor of the International Journal of Systems Science (2009- ). He is Member of the Editorial Boards for 27 other journals, including the International Journal of Production Economics. He is an Active Fellow of the European Academy for Industrial Management, Member of the Board of the International Foundation for Production Research, former Chair of IFAC TC 5.2 Manufacturing Modelling for Management and Control (2011-2017, currently a vice chair), Member of IFIP WG 5.7 Advances in Production Management Systems, IEEE System Council Analytics and Risk Technical Committee, Guest editor of special issues of European Journal of Operational Research, International Journal of Production Research, International Journal of Production Economics, Omega – The International Journal of Management Science, Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, Journal of Mathematical Modeling and Algorithms, and Annual Reviews in Control; he was General Scientific Chair of the 12th IFAC symposium INCOM’06, and IFIP APMS’2021, Chairman of International Program Committee of SCM’02, MOSIM’04, INCOM’09, INCOM’12, IESM’13, MIM’13, INCOM’15, IESM’17, GSC’18, MIM’19 and Chairman of Steering committee of MIM’16. Chairman of Organizing Committee of the International Conference MOSIM’01 and ROADEF’2011; last ten years, he was Member of Program Committees of over 200 International Conferences.
Panel Speaker IV
Dr. Ali Siadat
Full Professor
Laboratoire de Conception, Fabrication Commande
Arts et Métier Paris Tech
Centrede Metz
Metz, France
Ali Siadat is Professor at Laboratoire de Conception, Fabrication Commande, Arts et Métier Paris Tech, Centrede Metz in Metz, France. His current research interests include: computer aided manufacturing, modeling andoptimization of manufacturing processes, decision making in manufacturing, inspection planning and operationsresearch applications.
He has published numerous papers and book chapters in the aforementioned fields.
Meet the Editors Panel II
4:00 – 5:30 pm, Friday, July 4, 2025
Panel Chair
Dr. Laoucine Kerbache
Professor
Head of Engineering Management & Decision Sciences Division
College of Science and Engineering
Hamad Bin Khalifa University
Doha, Qatar
Dr. Laoucine Kerbache is Professor of logistics and supply chain management and a founding member (and currently head) of the Engineering Management and Decisions Science division in the College of Science and Engineering at Hamad Bin Khalifa University. He is also HEC Paris Emeritus Professor. He holds a PhD, an MSc, and a BSc degree in industrial engineering and operations research from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. His research areas span interfaces of industrial engineering, operations research, operations management, logistics, and supply chain management and analytics with a special focus on modeling and optimization of problems related to industrial facilities and service organizations. Over the last 35 years, Dr. Kerbache has been in academia for 25 years at HEC Paris where he was Professor of operations management, logistics, and supply chain management. He also held various academic and managerial positions including Associate Dean in charge of the PhD Program in the Paris campus, and Dean and CEO of HEC Paris in Qatar. He has been very active in research and has published over 150 publications in top-tier international journals and a significant number of academic textbooks. In addition, he supervised numerous theses and dissertations in various international institutions. He is an active member of numerous academic and research professional organizations such as INFORMS, POMS, MSOM, IEEE, EUROMA, IEOM, etc.
Panelists
Alexandre Dolgui, Dr.habil., Ph.D., IISE Fellow
Professor and Head
Automation, Production and Computer Sciences Dept.
IMT Atlantique, LS2N-CNRS
La Chantrerie, 4, rue Alfred Kastler – B.P. 20722
F-44307 NANTES Cedex 3, France
Editor-in-Chief, International Journal of Production Research (IJPR)
Dr. Alexandre Dolgui is an IISE Fellow, Distinguished Professor and the Head of Automation, Production and Computer Sciences Department at the IMT Atlantique, France. His research focuses on manufacturing line design, production planning and supply chain optimization. His main results are based on the exact mathematical programming methods and their intelligent coupling with heuristics and metaheuristics algorithms. He is the co-author of 5 books, the co-editor of 25 books or conference proceedings, the author of 270 refereed journal papers, 4 prefaces of books, 31 editorials and 37 book chapters as well as over 400 papers in conference proceedings. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Production Research, an Area Editor of Computers & Industrial Engineering, past Associate Editor of International Journal of Systems Science (2005-2008), IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics (2006-2009) and Omega-the International Journal of Management Science (2009-2012), consulting Editor of the International Journal of Systems Science (2009- ). He is Member of the Editorial Boards for 27 other journals, including the International Journal of Production Economics. He is an Active Fellow of the European Academy for Industrial Management, Member of the Board of the International Foundation for Production Research, former Chair of IFAC TC 5.2 Manufacturing Modelling for Management and Control (2011-2017, currently a vice chair), Member of IFIP WG 5.7 Advances in Production Management Systems, IEEE System Council Analytics and Risk Technical Committee, Guest editor of special issues of European Journal of Operational Research, International Journal of Production Research, International Journal of Production Economics, Omega – The International Journal of Management Science, Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, Journal of Mathematical Modeling and Algorithms, and Annual Reviews in Control; he was General Scientific Chair of the 12th IFAC symposium INCOM’06, and IFIP APMS’2021, Chairman of International Program Committee of SCM’02, MOSIM’04, INCOM’09, INCOM’12, IESM’13, MIM’13, INCOM’15, IESM’17, GSC’18, MIM’19 and Chairman of Steering committee of MIM’16. Chairman of Organizing Committee of the International Conference MOSIM’01 and ROADEF’2011; last ten years, he was Member of Program Committees of over 200 International Conferences.
Dr. Ali Siadat
Full Professor
Laboratoire de Conception, Fabrication Commande
Arts et Métier Paris Tech
Centrede Metz
Metz, France
Ali Siadat is Professor at Laboratoire de Conception, Fabrication Commande, Arts et Métier Paris Tech, Centrede Metz in Metz, France. His current research interests include: computer aided manufacturing, modeling andoptimization of manufacturing processes, decision making in manufacturing, inspection planning and operationsresearch applications.
He has published numerous papers and book chapters in the aforementioned fields.
Dr. Roel Leus
Professor of Operations Research
KU Leuven
Leuven, Belgium
Roel Leus obtained his PhD in Operations Research (OR) from KU Leuven (Belgium) in 2003, and is currently full professor of OR at the Faculty of Economics and Business of the same university. He is also the program director of the Business Engineering programs (for all campuses, covering around 2000 students), and the chairman of the university-wide Advisory Committee for the Chinese Region of KU Leuven. He was the head of the research group ORSTAT (Operations Research and Statistics) from 2012 to 2016. His main research interests are in sequencing and scheduling, combinatorial optimization, and decision making under uncertainty. Roel Leus has published over 80 papers in international journals such as Production and Operations Management, Journal of Operations Management, INFORMS Journal on Computing, Transportation Science, IIE Transactions, and European Journal of Operational Research. Prof. Roel Leus is currently also associate editor of the journal OR Spectrum, and special-issue editor of Annals of Operations Research and of Transportation Research Part E.