EURO South Africa Results

by Hans W Ittmann CSIR Built Environment, P O Box 395, Pretoria, 0001 [email protected]

IFORS 2011 MCC, Melbourne 10-15Slide July 1 2011 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Agenda

• Introduction • Brief feedback on Global Survey re South Africa • Highlight some of the interesting aspects • Personal knowledge of the OR scene • OR society – journal and conference • Private and public sector • Large organisations • Small consultancies • Academic institutions including research institution • Conclusions

Slide 2 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Introduction

• Only 10 responses received through the survey • Respondents to small to draw any conclusions • Still interesting to look at some of the results • Main input will be from personal local knowledge of the OR scene in South Africa • Brief background to OR society • OR at academic institutions • OR in private sector • OR in government • Biggest challenge for OR

Slide 3 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Survey - Position in Organisation

Frequency Percent Logistics Researcher - Freight flow 1 10.00 analyst Managing Director 1 10.00 Principal Operations Researcher - 1 10.00 look after a team of modellers who does stochastic modelling of operations Prof at Unisa. Private consultant 1 10.00 working mostly alone but within my own CC (closed corporation).

Senior Lecturer (Operations 1 10.00 research) Senior Lecturer - Supply Chain 1 10.00 Management Senior Scientist 1 10.00 Software Practitioner (algorithm 1 10.00 development for missile and UAV industry) Sole Proprietor of "Large Scale 1 10.00 Linear Programming Services" – www.lslps.com Supply Chain Strategist 1 10.00

Slide 4 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Survey - Name of your organisation

Frequency Percent Armscor Defence Institutes 1 10.00 Centre for Supply Chain 1 10.00 Frequency Percent Management Denel Dynamics a division of 1 10.00 Centre for Supply Chain Management 1 10.00 Denel Pty (Ltd) Imaging and control systems 1 10.00 Graduate School of Business 1 10.00 LSLPS 1 10.00 Leadership No name specified 1 10.00 LSLPS - "Large Scale Linear 1 10.00 Optimisation Group 1 10.00 Programming Solutions" Quant Consulting CC 1 10.00 Operational Research 1 10.00 Research And Analysis 1 10.00 Consulting Supply Chain Design & Innovation 1 10.00 Sasol Technology 1 10.00 Value Chain 1 10.00 UTi 1 10.00 Value chain optimisation 1 10.00 Unisa; Quant Consulting 1 10.00 University of Pretoria 1 10.00

Slide 5 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Survey - Objectives of the group

Frequency Percent Algorithm optimization 1 10.00 Develop decision support 1 10.00 tools; large emphasis on developing transport planning technology. Freight flow analysis 1 10.00 General OR services 1 10.00 OR Services 1 10.00 OR services 1 10.00 Optimisation of Strategic 1 10.00 Planning Supply chain design & 1 10.00 innovation To support the Sasol 1 10.00 businesses on a strategic, tactical and operational level with models and propo(?) supply chain management, 1 10.00 project management, financial management e- business and technology management

Slide 6 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Survey - Academic qualifications

Undergraduate Postgraduate Frequency Percent Frequency Percent BSc (Hons) University of 1 10.00 B.Eng(Industrial) -University of Pretoria 1 10.00 Johannesburg (RAU) MSc B.Sc Mathematics and applied 1 10.00 University of South Africa mathematics University of Stellenbosch M Eng University of Pretoria, 1 10.00 Industrial Engineering BSC - Chemistry, OR and Computer 1 10.00 M.Sc Operational Analysis, 1 10.00 Science - Uniwest South Africa University of Stellenbosch MSc (Stats, OR) Univ of Pretoria 1 10.00 BSc (Maths; Applied Maths; OR) 1 10.00 MSc (computer science, OR) Unisa University of Pretoria PhD (OR) Unisa BSc (math, stats) Univ of Pretoria 1 10.00 MSc Operations Research Uniwest 1 10.00 BSc Mathematics, University of Pretoria 1 10.00 South Africa BSc (Hons) OR, UNISA, South Africa MSc in OR, UNISA, South Africa 1 10.00

BSc(Hon) Nust, Applied Mathematics 1 10.00 MSc, University of Zimbabwe, 1 10.00 Mathematical Modelling Stellenbosch University, BComm - 1 10.00 Logisitcs, Operations Research and Masters Stellenbosch, Logistics 1 10.00 Quantitative Analysis PhD(Engineering) - University of 1 10.00 Stellenbosch, Mathematics & Logistics 1 10.00 Pretoria Stellenbosch University, BComm 1 10.00 University of Pretoria, Industrial 1 10.00 Honours in Operations Research Engineering

Slide 7 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Survey - OR Software packages

Frequency Percent Excel 1 12.50 GRTOLS 1 12.50 LINGO 1 12.50 Lingo 1 12.50 Mathematica 1 12.50 SPAR for reliability 1 12.50 Simul8 Sumulation 1 12.50 Visual Basic 1 12.50 Frequency Percent AIMMS 1 10.00 Arena - discrete event simulation of 1 10.00 operations GAMS / CPlex 1 10.00 GRTOLS; OMNI+ & H/Cplex all 1 10.00 from Haverly Inc LINDO 1 10.00 MS Excel 1 10.00 Matlab 1 10.00 Own, self-programmed 1 10.00 SAS 1 10.00 VISA MCDA 1 10.00

Slide 8 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Survey - Techniques used and barriers

• People are aware of many techniques • Limited use of most of the techniques • Frequent use of a few and very specific techniques

• Barriers – Find it difficult to convey the benefits of OR to the decision makers – There are no barriers. OR is accepted in the organisation, it is used widely and has started to deliver on international projects also

Slide 9 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Local Knowledge - ORSSA

• OR society was established in 1969 • Currently closed to 300 members • Over 100 attended the IFORS 2008 conference • Formally 5 chapters across the country – some active others dormant • Activities of ORSSA: • Bi-annual journal establish in 1985 • Quarterly newsletter • Annual conference • Student competition • Tom Rozwadowski award – best paper

• Initially large OR groups in mining house • Currently only aware of • SASOL Operations Research Team • Stochastic Modelling of Production, Refining and Blending of Fuels • Sasol Group Energy Linear Programming Model • Process Modelling of the Liquid Factory Value Chain • Global Tank Planning Model for the Solvents Business Unit • Finalist in Franz Edelman 2010 • INFORMS prize in 2011 • OPSI Systems • Vehicle routing, scheduling – optimisation and modelling • Many larger companies have in-house limited OR related staff • Number of small consultancies • Large scale LP for the mining industry • University professors • A number of these scattered across the country

• Government in general – very limited to almost non-exsisting • Defence • Defence Research Institute • Defence team won Franz Edelman award in 1996 • Eskom (electricity provider) • Limited want to re-introduce it • OR is performed but by non -OR people • Transnet (rail operator) • Limited use • SAA – member of Agifors; are using OR related packages • SAFCOL – forestry government owned, limited use of OR • CSIR – large OR group, combined with statisticians and logisticians • High level, specialist consulting • Variety of OR related projects over many years • Election forecasting, Crime prevention, Logistics, etc. Slide 12 © CSIR 2006 www.csir.co.za Local Knowledge – Universities

• Most universities have departments where OR is taught • Different Universities: • Stellenbosch university • General OR, Graph Theory, Logistics • Cape Town university • MCDM, Decision Theory • Univ. of Pretoria • Transport Planning • UNISA • Financial Modelling • Univ of Johannesburg • Logistics • Univ of Limpopo • General OR • Univ of Kwa-Zulu Natal • Applied Mathematics • Univ of the North West

Do you believe OR-type practice is thriving in your country? - Difficult to just affirm this - Many people are using OR without realizing it! Do people identify with the OR community? - OR community very small, personally I don’t think so If not, what labels might they use to describe their activity, e.g. logistics consultant, credit and risk analyst? - A whole range: decision support, supply chain management, logistics, decision science, etc How is the activity provided: in –house; by external commercial consultants; or by external academic consultants? - In all kinds of different ways – it is just very difficult to know and to give a view on this

Are there some industry sectors where OR-type work is particularly prevalent? - Chemical industry - Difficult to give a view on the entire South Africa situation Is the OR-type activity mainly project-based (usually via an OR-type group of experts) or integrated into a management decision process? - A whole mixture of OR-type activities How might IFORS and the South African OR Society identify those who are carrying out OR-type practice in your country? - One possibility is through ORSSA and possibly related professional bodies

• To give a complete picture is very difficult • OR is doing well in certain areas in South Africa – one of the biggest companies in the country has embraced it in a very big way • OR in South Africa is very practically orientated with very little real research being done • OR is done via different “names or phrases” in the country • There is not any hype around the term “analytics’ at all