Different Applications of Operations Research

 Vivek 19GSOB2010463
 Vivek Tevetia 19GSOB2010494
 Ranjeet Kumar 19GSOB2010446

Submitted to:
• .” Dr. Sumit Rastogi
 Introduction

“Operation research is a scientific method of providing executive

departments with a quantities basis for decisions regarding the
operations under their control”.
1. Allocation and Distribution in Projects:

(i) Optimal allocation of resources such as men materials machines, time

and money to projects.

(ii) Determination and deployment of proper workforce.

(iii) Project scheduling, monitoring and control.

2. Production and Facilities Planning:

(i) Factory size and location decision.

(ii) Estimation of number of facilities required.

(iii) Preparation of forecasts for the various inventory items and computation of economic order
quantities and reorder levels.

(iv) Scheduling and sequencing of production runs by proper allocation of machines.

(v) Transportation loading and unloading,

(vi) Warehouse location decision.

(vii) Maintenance policy decisions.

3. Programmes Decisions:

(i) What, when and how to purchase to minimize procurement

cost.
(ii) Bidding and replacement policies.
4. Marketing:

(i) Advertising budget allocation.

(ii) Product introduction timing.

(iii) Selection of advertising media.

(iv) Selection of product mix.

(v) Customer’s preference of size, colour and packaging of various products.

5. Organization Behaviour:

(i) Selection of personnel, determination of retirement age and skills.

(ii) Recruitment policies and assignment of jobs.

(iii) Recruitment of employees.

(iv) Scheduling of training programs.

6. Finance:

(i) Capital requirements, cash flow analysis.

(ii) Credit policies, credit risks etc.

(iii) Investment decision.

(iv) Profit plan for the company.

7. Research and Development:

(i) Product introduction planning.

(ii) Control of R&D projects.

(iii) Determination of areas for research and development.

(iv) Selection of projects and preparation of their budgets.

(v) Reliability and control of development projects thus it may be concluded that operation
research can be widely utilized in management decisions and can also be used as corrective
measure.
Recent Trends in Operation Research
• Data mining: With the widespread emergence of very large databases, many different
organizations are finding vital help from O.R. professionals in extracting the information they
really want. O.R.'s data mining methods, whose use is growing rapidly, give superior solutions in
diverse database-plumbing applications – such as predicting purchasing behavior, segmenting
customers, detecting fraud, assessing credit risk, and anticipating customer attrition.

• E-commerce: Even after the dot.com bust, E-commerce offers opportunities in business-to-
business and consumer areas of online purchasing, vendor purchasing models, online auctions,
and supply procurement. In addition to sellers, bidders are looking to O.R. models for decision
support on how to bid intelligently. Online grocers that make home delivery are another area of
opportunity for operations researchers.

• Environmental applications: Operations researchers offer aid in pollution control and the
design of systems to prevent shipping accidents.
Recent Trends in Operation Research
• Financial engineering: Financial engineering and related work is seeing some instances of growth for
operations researchers, with work in portfolio selection, portfolio models, and hedge fund strategies. Banks
rely on risk management modeling, among other applications. Insurers rely heavily on operations
researchers to do risk analysis and pricing. Some credit card companies use operation researchers to work on
credit scoring.

• Marketing: Direct marketing models, customer segmentation, Customer Relations Management (CRM) –
all rely on the service of operations researchers, both at the business-to-business and consumer level.

• Scheduling: This continues to offer employment for operations researchers, with O.R. being used for
sales forces, call centers, air traffic control, bus crewing, retail staffing, and hospital nurses.