CAVE
Computational Analytics, Visualisation & Education
What is the CAVE Lab?
The CAVE Lab (CAVE = Computational Analytics, Visualisation, and Education) at the Luxembourg Centre for Logistics and Supply Chain Management (LCL) is a state-of-the-art facility that promotes collaboration and communication between industry practitioners and academic researchers.
The lab is equipped with advanced visualisation technologies to facilitate joint prototyping sessions in which participants work together to co-create interactive dashboards for mathematical decision models.
The lab was launched in 2023 supported by the Ministère de l’Economie and the Chief Procurement Officers (CPO) Club, with the goal of advancing research and education in the field of supply chain management.
What do we do in the CAVE Lab?
In the lab industry, practitioners and academic researchers come together to work on a common project. The goal of these sessions is to co-create interactive dashboards for mathematical decision models that can be used to digitalise decision-making in supply chain management, procurement, and logistics. During the session, participants work together to design and build prototypes of the dashboards using the lab’s advanced visualisation technologies.
The prototypes created during these sessions are meant to be working models or proof-of-concept demos that can be used to test and evaluate different design choices, features, and functionalities. This process leads to a more efficient and effective way of testing ideas, as prototyping allows for live feedback, that can be integrated into the final product, and helps to identify potential issues that need to be addressed.
Additionally, joint prototyping sessions can also be an effective way to facilitate knowledge transfer between practitioners and researchers, with each group bringing their own unique perspectives and expertise to the project. This can lead to more innovative solutions and a better understanding between academia and industry.
Benefits of the CAVE Lab
The CAVE Lab offers several key benefits for companies and researchers:
Knowledge transfer
Bringing together industry practitioners and academic researchers allows for the exchange of expertise and perspectives, leading to more innovative solutions and a better understanding of the needs of both groups.
Customisation
The prototyping process allows for testing and evaluating different design choices, features, and functionalities in a live setting, providing valuable feedback early on in the development process.
Collaboration
The lab’s approach to co-creating interactive dashboards fosters knowledge transfer in both directions, from academia to practice and vice versa, allowing for fast learning and sparking new ideas to accelerate innovation.
Communication
The interactive dashboards created through joint prototyping sessions enable decision makers from different backgrounds to intuitively understand the result of a mathematical model, thereby improving trust and acceptance of an otherwise blackbox solution.
Our Research & Expertise
By leveraging the CAVE Lab’s advanced visualisation technologies and the collaboration between practitioners and researchers, the lab can help organisations to address a wide range of problems, and provide a platform for the development of new tools and strategies that can improve supply chain management processes in various areas:
Digital Procurement
- Measuring supplier performance
- Managing commodity market risks
Supply Chain Design
- Optimising supplier networks and routes
- Improving supply chain resilience and agility
Logistics Management
- Improving the efficiency of transportation and distribution
- Choosing locations for new warehouses and distribution centers
Inventory Control
- Optimising inventory levels to meet demand and minimise costs
- Improving forecasting accuracy for demand planning
Revenue Management
- Optimising pricing strategies to maximise revenue
- Measuring and increasing customer value
Our Team
The CAVE Network
The first CAVE Lab was established at MIT’s Center for Transportation and Logistics in Cambridge, MA, in 2017. Following its success, the China Institute for Supply Chain Innovation in Ningbo launched the second lab in 2021. The University of Luxembourg introduced the third CAVE Lab in 2023. The three labs form a loose alliance with the mission to innovate together, collaborate on research projects, share ideas, and contribute to joint code repositories.
Our Partners & Collaborators
The LCL CAVE Lab is financially supported by the Ministry of the Economy through its sponsorship of the Chair in Digital Procurement and the Luxembourg Centre for Logistics and Supply Chain Management at the Faculty of Law Economics and Finance within the University of Luxembourg. The LCL CAVE Lab works in close collaboration with the MIT CAVE Lab at the MIT Center for Transportation and Logistics as well as the NISCI CAVE Lab at the China Institute for Supply Chain Innovation.
Contact
Address
University of Luxembourg
6, rue Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi
L-1359 Luxembourg
Email
cavelab@uni.lu
Social
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