Optimization of costs in global supply chain – SABIC

 Overview

Company Description

SABIC is a global company which is based in Saudi Arabia. SABIC produces intermediate chemicals for, among other things, the plastic industry. A big part of the global production is executed in Saudi Arabia. SABIC exports a great variety of these products towards Europe by chemical tankers.

 Besides these exports from Saudi Arabia, SABIC produces chemicals in their manufacturing locations in Europe.

Project Description

Every month multiple chemical tankers are sailing towards several discharge ports in Europe to deliver the imports from Saudi Arabia. On these tankers, multiple products are shipped in different quantities. To have global alignment on product availability, complex parcel planning is required.

 The costs of this supply chain include for example the freight costs, import duties, and storage & handling costs. All costs related to these imports are available in the SAP system. The student will use this financial data in combination with interviews with global stakeholders to understand the financial components and constraints of our supply chain.

 Based on this gained understanding and the available literature, the student is requested to build a model that optimizes the total supply chain costs. In this model, the student includes several supply chain related constraints.

 Two modeling directions are defined:

1)    Model for yearly optimization of the supply chain network (e.g. change amount of vessel per month & increase / decrease safety stock)
2)    Model for monthly optimization of parcel scheduling including total shipment costs

Goals of the Project

Decrease total supply chain costs of global supply chain: Saudi Arabia – Europe.

Deliverables

Master’s thesis report / Thesis presentation / Excel tool

Essential Student Knowledge

Basic supply chain knowledge – Modelling

More information: escf@tue.nl