"Fulfilling real needs of people in harmony with the rest of the universe using mathematical models” 

Simme Douwe Flapper is an Assistant Professor at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) where he is carrying out research into the planning and control, information, organisational, business economic and environmental aspects of sustainable generation and distribution of products and services with a special focus on reuse. In the latter field, he has participated in a number of projects sponsored by the European Union and works with OEMs, third party service providers and master organizations all over the world.

He also has been involved in setting up of the Dutch network for the collection and processing of discarded white and brown goods, as well as in a similar project in Lancashire county (UK), and in the setup of the Dutch network for the collection and processing of discarded batteries. Other research areas are planning and control of production and distribution activities in the process industries, maintenance/reliability, and planning and control of human resources, including their availability. He has been a visiting professor at BI Norwegian Business School (Oslo, Norway), ITESM (Monterrey, Mexico), INPG (Grenoble, France), UPM (Madrid, Spain), METU (Ankara, Turkey).

Simme Douwe Flapper studied theoretical physics (MSc) and biology (BSc) at Utrecht University, and industrial engineering and management science (MSc) at TU/e. He has a PhD in physics from Radboud University Nijmegen. He worked 3 years for the Dutch Ministry of Environment and Housing, where he was responsible for the design and implementation of information systems for the registration of rest flows and emissions. During this time he was a member of the Dutch Commission on Emission Registration.

He acts as a referee for over 40 journals and has been a guest editor or editorial board member for various of these journals, including, European Journal of Operational Research, Computers & Operations Research, OR Spektrum and Supply Chain Management. He still is an editorial board member of Sustainability. He has been the co-initiator/chairman of a number of international workshops in the field of reuse.

• Eindhoven University of Technology, Department IE&IS

Partners in (semi-)industry

• DaimlerChrysler
• Dell
• DSM
• Heineken
• Philips
• Unilever