This study aims to examine how the use of consensus-based transactions, smart contracts,and interoperability, provided by blockchain, may benefit the blood plasma industry. Plasmafractionation is the process of separating blood into multiple components to garner benefitsof increased lifespan, specialized allocation, and decreased waste, thereby creating a morecomplex and flexible supply chain. Traditional applications of blockchain are developed onthe basis of decentralization—an infeasible policy for this sector due to stringent governmentregulations, such as HIPAA. However, the trusted nature of the relations in the plasmaindustry’s taxonomy proves private and centralized blockchains as the viable alternative.Implementations of blockchain are widely seen across pharmaceutical supply chains to combatthe falsification of possibly afflictive drugs. This system is more difficult to manage withblood, due to the quick perishable time, tracking/tracing of recycled components, and thenecessity of real-time metrics. Key attributes of private blockchains, such as digital identity,smart contracts, and authorized ledgers, may have the possibility of providing a significantpositive impact on the allocation and management functions of blood banks. Herein, we willidentify the economy and risks of the plasma ecosystem to extrapolate specific applications forthe use of blockchain technology. To understand tangible effects of blockchain, we developeda proof of concept application, aiming to emulate the business logic of modern plasma supplychain ecosystems adopting a blockchain data structure. The application testing simulates thesupply chain via agent-based modeling to analyze the scalability, benefits, and limitations ofblockchain for the plasma fractionation industry.

At the outset it may seem as if fields of business and history are two irreconcilable fields. However, careful study of both reveals that the two are far from dissimilar. After all, one cannot expect to conquer the world without impeccable logistics, and no organization succeeds without a competent culture. Two great civilizations rose to prominence because their supply chains and methodologies outstripped their contemporaries. The first is the Romans. Once a small village situated on the Italian Peninsula, Rome’s empire grew to encompass the entirety of the Mediterranean world during the first century CE. The second is the Mongols, nomadic horseman who formed the largest contiguous empire in history roughly twelve hundred years later. At its height, the Mongol civilization spanned from the Pacific Ocean in the east to the forests of Europe in the west.
Both great civilizations achieved their empires due to their innovative supply chains, organizational tactics, and culture. Each, however, presented their own unique solutions to the problem of world conquest by capitalizing on their respective strengths. For the Romans, this meant placing an emphasis on infrastructure, adopting and modifying the technologies of other peoples, and instituting a culture that emphasized achievement and resilience among an aristocratic elite. The Mongol’s, however, focused on their force’s mobility rather than infrastructure, emphasized recruiting of outsiders to supplement their weakness, and developed a meritocratic system largely free of aristocratic structure. Both empires, however, emphasized the importance of each soldier as a self-sufficient unit to ease the strain of the overall supply chain.
These two civilizations therefore provide valuable insight for two diametrically opposed business environments. The first being manufacturing companies, with the need for rigid processes and investments in infrastructure not unlike the Romans. The second being startups with their need for speed and flexibility much like the Mongols. Thus, by examining the past modern companies gain valuable insights in how to structure their organizations for the future.

This thesis discusses how American Airlines and its’ wholly owned regional partner Piedmont Airlines could improve schedule options by optimizing its existing operations enabling Piedmont to operate more flights with the same number of airplanes. This thesis uses data exclusively from Piedmont Airlines’ September 2019 Schedule, and focuses on operational improvements through minimizing downtime for aircraft both at hubs and outstations.

In the hubs, it was found that there was significant room for optimization to ensure that the aircraft are truly being used to their full potential versus long ramp wait times between flights. When looking at outstations, planes typically only spent the minimum required amount of time on the ground. The exception is if the plane was going to Remain Overnight (RON), however this also meant it was the last flight of the day, and it arrived in the evening or later. The thesis specifically looks at the flows for the week of September 14-20, 2019.

The purpose of this project is to create an affordable and low-environmental impact housing model for high-density urban living. Detailed research was completed to select the Arizonan city of Tempe for the basis of this model such as author's preference and alarming demographic and economic factors. The finalized model will consist of shipping containers that will be converted into housing. These domiciles are ideal for a maximum of 1-2 occupants. The units will be stacked into communities to accomplish high density. These shipping containers will be used rather than brand new, the community landscape will consist of natural desert landscaping, a recycling program will be offered, and solar panels will be used to power the units. The decision for these features fulfills both the mission of the project and markets to the main demographic group of residents in Tempe, Millennials, who usually place sustainability in high regard. These units are meant to be purchased by the target market and other citizens to increase homeownership rates in Tempe. Their ownership rights will be analogous owning a condo, where they will own the converted shipping container itself, but not the property the unit is placed on. In addition, these units qualify for traditional loans and will appreciate similar to normal housing options. After conceptualizing the idea, various costs were analyzed for construction of the units. A critical component of the project is to receive government grants to fund the venture in order to continue the mission and keep prices of these units low. This model is expandable and could be moved to other cities within the state or potentially other states through future government grant attainment and success with the first installation. These communities will be managed by a company, Shipping Designs, which will be a limited liability company created by the author, Shauna Burgoyne.

Sagebrush Coffee is a small business in Chandler, Arizona that purchases green beans, roasts them in small batches for quality, and ships fresh, gourmet roasted coffee beans across the nation. Deciding which coffee beans to buy and roast is one of the most crucial business decisions Sagebrush and other gourmet coffee roasters face. Further complicating this decision is the fact that coffee is a crop, and like all crops, has a specific growing season and the exact same product cannot usually be ordered from year to year, even if it proves to be successful. The goal of this research is to use data analytics and visualization to help Sagebrush make better purchasing decisions by identifying consumer purchasing trends and providing a recommendation for their portfolio mix. In the end, I found that Latin American coffees are popular with both returning and first-time customers, but a specific country of origin does not appear to be associated with the top coffee producing countries. Additionally, December is a critical month for Sagebrush and Sagebrush should make sure to target the states with the most sales: California, Pennsylvania, and New York. Arizona has growth potential as it is not one of the top three locations, despite the presence of a physical store. Also included in the following report is a portfolio recommendation suggesting how many of each product based on region, processing type, and roast level to carry in inventory.

When making investment decisions many different indicators are taken into consideration before picking a stock/corporation to invest in (retail or institutional). Traditionally these indicators tend to be financial measures such as earnings per share, price to earnings ratio, price to book value ratio, dividend yield/payout ratio, etc. Often these indicators do not take into consideration the actual running intricacies of a company as they are simply based on historical financial statements, thus limiting an investor's decision-making ability. In this paper I analyze several companies stock performance to see if analyzing operational factors such as supply chain management before making an investment decision would have resulted in a profitable investment and thus prove as a reliable investment indicator. To do this I focused my analysis over a period of 5 years on two companies within three different industries; Fast Food, Processing, and Ecommerce. These industries were selected as the nature of their businesses require intensive supply chains thus this strategy would be most applicable to them as opposed to a software or IT company. Of the two companies selected from each respective industry one company would be listed/analyzed in Gartner's ranking of the "Annual Supply Chain Top 25" while the other company would not be. This Gartner ranking would serve as a measure of whether or not a company had a good supply chain. These companies then had their traditional financial metrics evaluated to see if supply chain analysis indirectly encapsulated some of these metrics as well. The goal of this analysis was to find if there was a strong correlation between companies listed on Gartner's rating scale and strong stock performance. If this was true this would suggest that there is a benefit to be captured by investors through using supply chain analysis as an indicator when making investment decisions.

The topic of our project "Innovation and the City of Tomorrow Through a Supply Chain Perspective" derives from the fields of Innovation, Supply Chain Management, and Public Policy. Many people ask themselves about the future, how will it look? To answer this question, we conducted research about how the city of Tempe, in Arizona, can utilize emerging technology to address its societal needs by the year 2035. With an expected 35 percent increase in population, the city will need to find ways to house, transport, and provide access to the basic needs of their constituents. To tackle these problems, we considered innovative technologies and trends and analyzed their outcomes through the magnifying glass of supply chain, offering insight into how these technologies are disrupting their respective industries and most importantly, who benefits and who loses. Because the topic is so broad, we have decided to focus on addressing societal needs that are essential for Tempe to satisfy the needs of their constituents as they attempt to become one of the most thriving cities in America. Those critical needs are: residential development, electricity needs, and transportation.

This study explores the best known practices of small businesses from different entrepreneurs' perspectives and attempts to address the question: are there consistencies between different entrepreneurs' approaches to establishing and growing a business? Ten entrepreneurs from a variety of business types (product and service) were interviewed using a consistent question template that asked questions regarding financing, business strategy (and scalability), interpersonal forces, innate qualities, partnerships, and resources. The primary overlaps between these businesses are with regard to the confluence between personal risk and business strategy, the risk of working with friends and family, the capacity to scale relative to special content knowledge or process knowledge, and partnerships
etworking.

This is a creative thesis project on the topic of the third party logistics industry, and the improvements that are possible through the implementation of goods to person technologies. The scope of the project entails the relationship between Company X, which is a third party logistics provider, and Company Y, a major toy retailer. This thesis identifies current trends for the third party logistics industry such as rising operating costs and average savings achieved through these business relationships. After identifying the negative trends that Company X is vulnerable to such as high human resources costs, and cost of quality issues. Given the findings derived from industry data, a final recommendation was settled on to improve productivity and ultimately reduce the use of temporary labor for Company X. The implementation of a goods to person technology solution provides the opportunity to reduce hours of operation, man hours, as well as direct and indirect costs such as labor. Research has proven that firms operating in the retail industry rely heavily on temporary labor to handle the seasonal demand brought by the holidays, thus this recommendation could be applied to a variety of operations. The data compiled throughout this thesis have major implications for the third party logistics industry and achieving long term profitability in operations management.

The Internet of Things (IoT) refers to the system of 'smart' inter-connected networked devices that contain sensors to communicate information to the Internet. Due to the complex and intricate nature of IoT technologies, in addition to the many applications of IoT, the IoT has the potential to revolutionize how we interact and work every day. The information gathered through IoT is aggregated and can be used to improve business decision making, as well as contribute to a greater society. IoT spans various market sectors including retail, energy, and transportation. IoT can also be used to improve efficiencies within the supply chain. By increasing the transparency of items in-transit, in addition to providing greater visibility about inventory usage and consumer consumption habits, there are many implications of IoT that can be utilized to transform logistical processes. While some literature exists that discusses the impact of the IoT on the supply chain, the findings are limited in size and scope and tend to focus on particular implementations of IoT technologies. Further research is necessary to evaluate the impact of IoT to advance supply chain best practices and to understand the potential implications of the IoT in improving supply chain planning and distribution. This thesis aims to address this gap in the literature. By focusing on supply chain management, the thesis will look at the context in which the IoT operates, the market and implications of IoT devices, current logistics processes, the capabilities of IoT, as well as the potential problems and weaknesses with the implementation of the IoT.