King's College London

King’s welcomed top defence logistics experts at a workshop last month to share insights on global supply chain resilience in times of uncertainty. Vice Admiral Andy Kyte, Chief of Defence Logistics and Support, and Paul Larcey, Knowledge Transfer Manager in Security and Defence, Innovate UK gave keynote addresses to attendees from across industry.

The discussion will feed into a new research project aiming to develop a systems approach using artificial intelligence to supply chain management in the defence sector.

Led by Professor Rym M'Hallah, Chair of Systems Engineering at King’s and Dr Hasan Turan, Senior Lecturer in the School of Systems and Computing at the University of New South Wales, Australia, the workshop enabled the researchers to deepen their understanding of the challenges faced by government and industry across defence global supply chain networks.

Rym explains, “we are in an unprecedented period of rapidly evolving, unpredictable, geopolitical events that threaten the resilience of our supply chains. Supply chains are critical for providing us with everything from food to raw materials to energy and power, yet they are vulnerable to these international shocks.

“Better understanding these challenges from an industry and policy point of view, will allow us to define and model a data-informed framework which we hope will make supply chains more agile, resilient, robust and scalable.”

The workshop examined a number of key areas including how to manage global supply chains across defence, from extraction of minerals to manufacturing to dispatching to frontlines, how to scenario plan for future difficulties while supply chains are distributed across the world and key raw materials are concentrated in troublesome locations, and how to design sustainability into supply chains.

Vice-Admiral Andy Kyte said, “Resilient supply chains are critical for war, deterrence, and national security. Collaboration between government, industry and academia is critical to developing solutions to the major challenges that lie ahead.

“This workshop at King’s provided a valuable opportunity to bring key stakeholders together to better understand how we can use a systems approach and harness new technologies to enhance logistics and supply chain management for defence.”

Paul Larcey said, “At a time when the gains of globalisation and its extended supply chains are coming under increasing strain, it is vital that all elements of the UK defence and security sectors work together in a systematic way to construct resilience, and King’s are helping to start a discourse on the essential component of the UK national security”

Dr Hassan Turan said, “it was insightful to hear similar issues highlighted by industry and government experts, underscoring the complexity and interconnectedness of defence supply chains. Addressing these issues promptly and with a holistic perspective is essential for enhancing national readiness and sovereignty, which is the primary goal of this project.”

Professor Rym M'Hallah said, “we are in an unprecedented period of rapidly evolving, unpredictable, geopolitical events that threaten the resilience of our supply chains. Supply chains are critical for providing us with everything from food to raw materials to energy and power, yet they are vulnerable to these international shocks.

“This workshop offered a timely opportunity to integrate expertise from defence, industry, and government with scientific knowledge from Engineering and Security Studies at King’s to propose operational, tactical, and strategic holistic solutions. This insight will help us shape our project to design more resilient, responsive, and agile defence supply chains.”

Rym and Hassan will use the findings from the initial workshop to inform a white paper that sets out how AI and modelling can be used in a decision theatre software tool to support supply chain management. The researchers aim to continue working with government and industry partners to explore these areas of research, in order to build greater resilience within the global supply chain.

If you are interested in finding out more about collaborating with King’s on our exciting research, you can contact the Enterprise Team.