Past Awards
The 2010 INFORMS Prize is awarded to Jeppesen, a Boeing Company, for the outstanding wide-spread use of Operations Research throughout the company. Jeppesen maintains, manufactures, and distributes flight manuals that contain navigational and other safety-of-flight information for over 800,000 pilots and 400 airlines worldwide. In 1997, Jeppesen saw its service deteriorate when a growing line of over 100,000 aviation charts overwhelmed its production system. The company responded by establishing a small OR group to analyze its production problems. In only two short years, Jeppesen was able to eliminate late delivery of product orders, reducing costs by nearly $3 million annually. Since then, the expanding OR department has consistently applied a wide variety of OR techniques throughout the enterprise to improve operations and to support decision-making related to resource utilization, inventory optimization, capital investments, market strategy, product development and pricing. Today, more than 75 professionals with an OR background, led by and connected to the central OR department through a strategic community of practice are helping Jeppesen apply analytics to make better decisions, build better products, and offer better services.
By awarding the 2010 INFORMS Prize to Jeppesen, INFORMS recognizes the world-class capabilities and contributions of the Jeppesen Operations Research department.
2010 INFORMS Prize was presented to Stefan Karish, Marilyn Aragon, and Mark Van Tine of Jeppesen by INFORMS Prize Committe Chair Jeff Camm at the 2010 Practice Meeting in Orlando, FL..
“Jeppesen uses O.R. to address both the strategic and tactical problems we encounter on a continual basis,” says Mark Van Tine, Jeppesen president and CEO (pictured above, far right). “INFORMS has bestowed a significant honor upon us. It independently confirms the impact OR has at Jeppesen, while highlighting our commitment to leveraging O.R. for the benefit of our customers and the success of our company. We simply could not do much of the highly sophisticated work we do without this fundamental capability.” Click here to watch video of Jeppesen accepting the 2010 INFORMS Prize.