Industrial Engineering Students Take Third at International Competition

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The University of Arkansas team was advised by industrial engineering professor Manuel Rossetti and comprised of Luke Turner, Kyle Kraichely and Olivia Ohlstein.

A team of industrial engineering students bested 55 teams from around the world in a recent industrial simulation competition in Orlando, Florida.

The competition, known as the IISE/Arena Student Simulation Competition, was held in conjunction with the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers Annual Conference and Expo May 19-20.

Including 58 teams from around the world, the competition allowed undergraduate students to demonstrate their skills with the simulation software Arena, and compete against the world's best simulation students. The winning teams compete for cash prizes and the honor of being recognized as the top simulation students in the world.

The University of Arkansas team, advised by industrial engineering professor Manuel Rossetti and comprised of Luke Turner, Kyle Kraichely and Olivia Ohlstein, placed third in the competition and will receive $1,500.

The project represented a design problem for a realistic (but fictitious) company within the emerging area of co-working space. Co-working space companies offer a place for freelance workers, work-at-home professionals, and others to work in a shared office environment. The design requirements included redesigning the workspace layout, evaluating the number and types of seating arrangements, identifying and recommending process changes to reduce cost and improve customer satisfaction. Complicating the problem ensuring that the design can handle peak demand as well as projected growth in services. The students utilized Arena software to provide solutions to the presented problems.

"The students did a masterful job of data analytics, modeling the design configurations, and validating their recommendations," Rossetti said. "Their proposed solutions will increase company revenues and improve customer satisfaction. Just what industrial engineers do every day."

About Arena: The trademarked Arena Simulation Software is recognized as the leader in discrete event simulation. Used by the majority of Fortune 100 firms, the software allows businesses to evaluate the full implications of business decisions before they are put into practice. The activity-based models can be effectively used to simulate almost any process. Arena has been the world's leading discrete event simulation software for over 30 years.

About IISE: IISE is the world's largest professional society dedicated solely to the support of the industrial and system engineer. It is an international, nonprofit association that provides leadership for the application, education, training, research and development of industrial and systems engineering.