Dr. Asad Ata Presents at INFORMS Annual Business Analytics Conference (2021)

12 Apr 21

The ongoing Covid-19 crisis demands that like every other industry, the food and beverage industry too must adopt to the new normal where the transition is happening from Dine-In’s to Take-Away items.

At the 2021 INFORMS Annual Business Analytics Conference, Dr. Ata presented a model that uses various analytical methods to analyse and understand customer demand and map it into an inventory policy that minimizes waste while optimizing the revenue. Segmenting for different revenue generating menus and analysing trends in customer demands, multivariate regression was used to understand the demand for lower revenue generating products, which turn out to be critical in the decision making process for a customer to buy or not to buy. A weekly forecast for different menus for customer demand was generated using the Newsvendor Model and matched to an inventory policy for the raw materials. Simulation proved the model to be robust enough to apply in the restaurant industry where it is currently being tested.

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