During the INFORMS Annual Meeting in San Francisco, the Railway Application Section (RAS) conducted a roundtable, moderated by Dharma Acharya, about the use of AI in Rail and the evolution of AI-assisted railroad decision-making. The panelists were Mabby Amouie of Norfolk Southern, Asim Ghanchi of BNSF, Darkhan Mussanov of DB E.C.O. North America, and Michael […]
Following are lightly edited questions and answers from Patricia’s presentation on Orchestrating Optimization with Precision Agents at the INFORMS Analytics+ conference and in a subsequent webinar (watch the recording here and see Patricia’s previous blog post for reference.) Question: What is the difference between an agent and a tool? Patricia: The agent is the decision […]
This post is based on Patricia’s presentation at the INFORMS Analytics+ Conference and in a subsequent webinar (watch the recording here). For decades, enterprise optimization systems have been built around a familiar assumption: if you can centralize enough data, encode enough constraints, and build a sufficiently sophisticated model, you can produce better operational decisions. That […]
Built on precision, safety, and long investment cycles, the rail industry has historically adopted innovation deliberately rather than aggressively. Significantly, AI is reshaping that pattern. Insights from the first two years (2024 and 2025) of the AI In Rail survey, conducted by Princeton Consultants with the Northwestern University Transportation Center (NUTC), point to a clear […]
For the Optimization Catalyst podcast (listen here) Steve spoke with Solange Gelman, Director of IT Application Development and Airport Operations Technologies at United Airlines, and David O’Keefe, head of Alliances America at Gurobi. Following are lightly edited excerpts. David: Solange, you oversee both passenger-facing and operational technologies at United Airlines. Could you give us a […]
For the Optimization Catalyst podcast (listen here) Steve spoke with Suzay Passari, Head of Innovation and Transportation at UPS, and David O’Keefe, head of Alliances America at Gurobi. Following are lightly edited excerpts. Sunzay noted that UPS, a 118-year-old company, presents unique challenges and opportunities for transformation due to its established legacy in technology, processes, […]
Following is an excerpt from Steve’s 3/31 presentation to transportation and logistics executives, hosted by Stifel’s equity research group. There are rail executives who talk about disruption because, starting around 2011, the railroads started to lose massive market share to trucking. The gap is presently widening. If rail transportation costs less and improves supply chain […]
On April 6, Steve Sashihara returned to Road Dog Trucking Radio to discuss trucking and emerging technology. Following are excerpts of his conversation with host Mark Willis. Mark Willis: It’s great to welcome back Steve Sashihara with Princeton Consultants. Steve Sashihara: Thanks, Mark. Great to be on. Every year, we do a survey with transportation executives on what’s […]
Every year Princeton Consultants surveys executives about digital disruption and its impact on freight transportation and supply chains. In 2022, as with previous years, the largest segment of survey responders, 58 percent, were executives at transportation carriers. The other segments were: Finance, Media and Government executives, 19 percent; Shippers executives, 15 percent; and Suppliers executives, 8 percent. […]
Steve is a frequent guest on Sirius XM Radio’s Road Dog Trucking, hosted by Mark Willis. Following is a lightly edited excerpt from his April 1 appearance. Steve Sashihara: Fortuitously, we added electric trucks to our survey this year. The president’s proposed infrastructure plan is very heavy on electric vehicles, and I think trucking will […]
