Global Ocean Transportation Reliability Initiative

The design, procurement, and management of a global ocean transportation (GOT) network is a challenging task.  By definition, the network spans multiple continents, involves a variety of business units, and can impact and influence operations from procurement to final assembly.  Additionally, the ocean carrier industry has particular pressures in terms of market structure, levels of competitiveness, and transparency (or lack thereof) of pricing and service levels.  While the ocean carrier market appears to be global on the surface, in reality most of its activities are directed at supporting specific trade lanes.  Rather than a single global market with many players, it is better seen as many individual markets with a few players within each market (trade lane).  This initiative examined the root causes of transportation variability as well as its impact on shippers and their inventory policies.

Research Publications

• Das, L., Kalkanci, B., & Caplice, C. (2014) “The Impact of Bimodal and Lognormal Distributions in Ocean Transportation Transit Time on Logistics Costs,” Transportation Research Record 2409, pp 63-73. Transportation Research Board.
• “Global Ocean Freight Reliability,” MIT CTL Internal Report, Innovations in Transportation Roundtable, Oct. 2012.
• “Managing Global Supply Chains – Building End-To-End Reliability,” MIT CTL Internal Report, Innovations in Transportation Roundtable, Oct. 2011.
• “Global Ocean Transportation Project,” Ford Motor Company. Initial, interim, and final project reports, Sep. 2010 – Jun. 2011.

Research Partners

Research Team