2010 - ERCIS

University of Münster –
Department of Information Systems –
Chair for Information Systems and Logistics
18
About the Chair
The objective of the Chair for Information
Systems and Supply Chain
Management is to make a qualitative
research contribution in the areas of
supply chain management, operations
management and logistics management
with respect to the development
of new theories and concepts,
the transfer of research to practice
and the quality of teaching.
In cooperation with industrial and
research organizations, Prof. Hellingrath
and his staff of eight assistants
develop methods for optimizing
supply chains for developing and applying
information systems. The research
team combines expertise from
Business Administration, Information
Systems, Computer Science, Logistics
and Political Economy. This expertise
enables the team to approach supplychain
management issues in a multidisciplinary
way.
Teaching is of great importance for
the chair and is concentrated on the
BSc and MSc programs in Information
Systems and Business Economics. It
focuses on the principles and application
of Information Systems for the
design, planning and execution of intra-
and inter-company supply chains.
By offering several project seminars
in cooperation with industrial partners,
students get the chance to put
the learned scientific knowledge,
skills and competencies into practice.
A recently implemented web-based
platform helps students make contact
with companies, find internships, and
write their Master theses in a practical
context. Furthermore, students are
encouraged to take part in exchange
programs with foreign universities,
e.g. with the Pontifícia Universidade
Católica do Rio de Janeiro in Brazil.
Research Topics
The Chair for Information Systems
and Supply Chain Management does
research on the design, planning and
control of supply chains in combination
with information technology. He
aims to develop service-oriented concepts
to enable companies to adapt
to changing business environments.
Achievement of flexibility in a supply
chain (e.g., by [re]positioning the
order decoupling point in a product
lifecycle or by using multi-echelon
inventory strategies) is a special research
focus. Further research efforts
are being made in the field of
decentralised coordination
of supply chains by means of
a self-developed agent-oriented
framework and in the
field of “green” supply chain
management.
Current
Research
Coordination approaches
and their practical applicability
are subject to current supply
chain management research.
In order to support practical
applicability, a framework
that allows the implementation
and quantitative evaluation
of the improvements of
decentralized coordination approaches
is currently being developed. The
framework will contain a modelling and
runtime environment for decentralized
supply-chain coordination approaches,
accompanied by a guiding method
supporting its application.
Further research is focusing on the
development of a method that uses