MIT Supply Chain Research Network Expands to South America

-- Supply Chain Management Review, 3/17/2008 1:43:00 PM

By Sean Murphy

Associate Editor

 The Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for Transportation and Logistics has expanded its network of international supply chain education centers with a new location in Bogota, Colombia, which opened earlier this month.

MIT and LOGyCA, a logistics company based in Colombia, have created the Center for Latin-American Logistics Innovation, which opened on March 1. The school and the company signed a 10-year, $19 million agreement to open and run the center.

LOGyCA, a consultant firm which has worked with over 17,000 businesses in Colombia and Latin America over the past 20 years, plans to house the center in its Bogota headquarters.

This venture into Latin America is the latest international supply chain education center MIT has created. In 2003, the school made a similar move into Europe by partnering with the Zaragosa Logistics Center in Spain.

According to a release from MIT, the Bogota-based center “will help Latin American businesses and individuals compete in local, regional and global markets by delivering leading-edge research, technology and educational programs in logistics, transportation and supply chain management.”

Details of how the school will interact with the new center are still being worked out, but future projects and programs will likely be similar to programs existing between MIT and the Zaragosa Center in Spain, according to Becky Schneck Allen, a spokesman for MIT's Logistics Center in Cambridge, Mass. 

Right now, she said, MIT and the Zaragosa Center conduct student exchange programs and perform joint research projects, which will most likely expand to include the Bogota location.

Yossi Sheffi, a professor of engineering systems at MIT and director of the school’s Center for Transportaion and Logistics, said the Latin American center will broaden the supply chain knowledge scope of both MIT and the Zaragosa Center in Spain.

“Globalization continues to bring new opportunities for growth — and immense challenges. To stay on the cutting edge and help companies keep pace with these changes, we are expanding our unique network of learning centers where faculty, students, researchers and companies across continents collaborate on supply chain and logistics projects that have global impact,” said Sheffi.   

Rafael Florez, Director of LOGyCA, said the new center will help develop Colombian and Latin American logistics.

“By joining the MIT-CTL network, CLI will actively participate in the development of global educational and research programs. It will also give CLI the opportunity to develop solutions that reflect the unique logistics and supply chain challenges in our economies. Latin American business leaders will have access to world-class academic programs that will contribute to improving value chains through the continent. This has always been LOGyCA’s mission: leadership in innovation for value networks,” Florez said.