www.orsp.org.ph November 2018 APORS 2021: Philippines Wins Bid to Host the 2021 Asia Pacific Regional Meeting by Francis Miranda During the recently-held Associa- speakers included Edward H. tion of Asia Pacific Operations Re- Kaplan from Yale University who search Societies (APORS) regional talked about “Operations Research meeting last August 2018 in Kath- and Public Health”, and Matthias mandu, Nepal, ORSP won its bid to Ehrgott from Lancaster University host the APORS 2021 meeting in who spoke about “Considerations Cebu. of Sustainability in Transportation Radisson Hotel in Kathmandu—home away from home for the APORS 2018 participants. – A Case for Multi-objective Optimi- The APORS meeting is held every zation”. three years and is hosted by one of lowing members in his team: the member societies which in- Nezam Madhavi-Amiri from the There were also more than 100 clude the national OR societies of OR Society of Iran as Vice Presi- papers presented during the con- dent, Adibah Shuib from the OR ference, which made up for a very Society of Malaysia as Secretary, varied and enlightening academic and Xudong Hu from the OR Socie- program. ORSP’s own Francis Mi- ty of China as Treasurer. randa served as chair in one of the parallel sessions on “Applications The APORS 2018 held in Nepal of OR in Management”. from August 6 to 9 at the Radisson Hotel in Kathmandu was a suc- The social activities were equally . Stage is all set for the conference cess. More than 150 participants interesting, which included a cul- from 22 countries attended. IFORS tural program on the third day of Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, was present through its IFORS the conference. On the fourth and Iran, Japan, Malaysia, Nepal, New Distinguished Lecture delivered last day, the Nepal OR Society or- Zealand, the Philippines, Singa- by Leo Liberti on the topic: ganized a tour within the Kath- pore and South Korea. The last “Random Projections in Mathemat- mandu valley, which was very time ORSP hosted the regional ical Programming”. James Mac- well-appreciated by the interna- meeting was in January 16 to 18, Gregor Smith gave the IFORS Dis- tional participants. 2006 at the Dusit Hotel in Manila. tinguished This time around, the venue pro- Tutorial on posed by the organizing commit- the topic: tee led by Director Jed Loma, was “Evacuation Cebu, from February 16 to 19, Network 2021. Perfor- mance Mod- In line with this development, elling and ORSP Immediate Past President Optimiza- Francis Miranda was elected Pres- tion”. Other APORS Council meeting members (l to r): Adibah Shuib, Soong Joo Park, Govinda Ta- ident of the APORS, with the fol- mang, Sunity Shrestha, Nezam Madhavi-Amiri, Yuhong Dai, Chang Won Lee and Francis keynote Miranda discuss regional matters and strategies. 1 Forum Features OR Applications in the Food, Delivery, Airline and Banking Sectors by Janni Boydon OR in the Service sector came alive focused on the importance of con- dience of students, teachers, and as four speakers talked about OR sidering last mile logistics, i.e., practitioners. in the food, delivery, airline and bringing goods and services to the banking sectors during the 2018 exact point of delivery after going Vicente Reventar, last speaker for ORSP Technical Forum held last through the forum and also currently a lec- September 29, 2018 at the Leong the main turer at the Ateneo de Manila Uni- Hall, Ateneo de Manila University. networks. versity, discussed applications of It was an eye-opening treatment of With chal- Opera- a subject from speakers who have lenges of a tions had extensive experiences in their customer Re- industries. As one participant com- base de- search mented, “Daming sustansya sa sem- manding and inar na to. The best! Gamit na gamit more ser- Analyt- sa thesis namin. More speakers pls”. vice at a ics in cheaper the V. Reventar after his talk on the bank- The first speaker is Restaurant G. Estabaya deals with the last cost, cou- ing and finance sectors receives his Bank- Systems Officer of Jollibee Foods mile of delivering goods to cus- plaque from organizers J. Boydon, A. tomers. pled with a Domingo and M. de Guzman U. ing and Corporation highly vari- Finan- Benjamin able density distribution of cus- cial Sectors. By demonstrating an Santiago, Jr., tomers spread across 7000+ is- actual application using a particu- who talked lands of the Philippines, this indus- lar software, he showed the huge about initia- try has been served well by Opera- impact that optimization and man- tives for tions Research, along with Data agement of cash-in-vaults of Auto- optimiza- Analytics. mated Teller Machines can do in tion in the providing service to customers of Quick Ser- The third speaker was Felix Cruz, the banking industry. vice Restau- former chairman of PAL, who B. Santiago tackles the quick service restaurant industry. rant Indus- talked about the role of Operations Past and present ORSP directors try. He Research in the Philippine airline Malu De Guzman, Vic Reventar, showed actual examples of im- industry. The numerous applica- Alleli Domingo, and Janni Boydon, proving service performance tions of Op- moderated the forum. The event through simulation especially with erations was a success with a total of 528 the recent introduction of self- Research participants from different order kiosks. He was also particu- practices lar about little improvements that schools, namely: Quezon City Poly- ranging technic University, University of can create big impacts such as the from Southern Mindanao, Colegio de simple practice of optimizing table scheduling San Juan de Letran, Baliuag Uni- -chair mix in dining areas. He of flights, made this clearer by highlighting pilots, and versity, PUP Manila, De La Salle that a 1% cost reduction for a mul- airplane University, San Sebastian College ti-billion dollar company amounts units, plan- Recoletos de Cavite, UP Diliman, to a big contribution. F. Cruz focuses on the various ning of University of Makati, Adamson roles that OR plays in the air- line industry. routes University, UP Los Ban os, St. Dom- Cost reduction was also the key across Phil- inic College of Asia, and Mapua principle of the next speaker, Glo- ippine islands and to other nations, Institute of Technology. At the end ria Estabaya, Vice President for as well as managing promotions of the forum, all the participants Operations and Business Analytics like seat sales and overbooking to from practitioners, academics and of Airfreight 2100, Inc. Emphasiz- optimize opportunities for profit students, gave the forum high ing that logistics cost is actually were eye-opening for the large au- 27% of total shipment cost, she marks! ! 2 Participants Learn about Machine Learning by Elise del Rosario The Workshop on Machine Learn- track my learning of the language, Participants included: Arman Loui ing using Python held from June which I had started taking up in Arquilada, Arian A. Rabino, Gina 22 to 23 at the Mapua University Coursera.” The workshop leaders Tumang, Maria Elena Timbang, R- attracted 31 participants. With the cited the various resources to get Jay Quiambao, Kimberly Hazel aim of introducing Machine Learn- participants started in serious pro- Serrano, Ruselle An- ing and introducing Python, the gramming. In cooperation with drew Manalang, Elmer Perez, Workshop was successful in get- Cypher Learning, participants Gerard Cortez, Flor Mangalino, ting participants acquainted with were provided access to all the ma- Renilda S. Layno, Hardy D. Sierra, the various applications of Python. terials – slides, programs, data sets Ronald Arciaga, Raymond Sedilla, – which they could use after the ORSP Past President Francis Mi- Workshop. Gloren Fuentes, Joel De Goma, randa led the team consisting of Josseline Nolasco, Marjorie Na- Trixie de Guzman, Vanessa Ber- Earlier, ORSP had also conducted a vales, Martha Lauren Tan. mudez and Danielle Hizola in Workshop in R, and many partici- guiding participants as they went pants acquainted with both com- through pre-worked Python code mented on the advantages they see that covered 5 cases. Cases ranged in shifting to Python. Other partici- from predicting: auto. Insurance pants appreciated the opportunity levels, house prices, credit scores, to add to their set of Analytics survivors of a ship wreck, birth tools. In general, participants gave weight, and geographic clusters. the course and the trainers a score This was preceded by an extensive indicating satisfaction with the introduction of real-life uses of conduct of the Workshop and re- machine learning. quested for additional training in other Analytics topics. Even as the introduction clarified that the two-day training is not a Participants came from: Cagayan programming course, participants State University, De la Salle – Col- got an idea of the language syntax lege of St Benilde, Holy Angel Uni- and worked their way through versity, Mapua (Intramuros), Ma- changing some codes to see the pua University, Sunlife, Technopo- effects on the output. Participants ly, Inc. An annual offering of the were exposed to a multitude of ORSP, the Workshop this year was built-in Python libraries that they held in partnership with the Ma- could call for their applications. As pua University and Cypher Learn- Board Director Rex Robielos ing. quipped, “This will certainly fast Workshop participants pose for a photo after receiving their certificates: (top to bottom): Holy Angel University, De La Salle College of St. Benilde and Sunlife; and participants from the host school, Participants listen to F. Miranda give the Introductory Lecture. Mapua University; and all participants with the organizers. 3 Conference Looks Back at the Last 30 Years of OR in the Philippines by Iris Martinez Founded in 1987, the Operations including breakthroughs and Research Society of the Philippines ORSP accomplishments and per- celebrated its 30th year anniver- sonal experiences in trying to get sary during its national conference OR to work.