The Centre for Operations and Business Analytics aims to bring academic research closer to businesses and develop solutions to management challenges in a context shaped by advances in artificial intelligence.
How can academic research help businesses improve processes, make decisions and respond to the challenges of digital transformation? Católica Porto School of Business and Economics has launched the Centre for Operations and Business Analytics, a new centre dedicated to bridging scientific knowledge and business practice in the fields of Operations Management and Business Analytics.
The centre aims to foster collaboration between researchers and businesses, encouraging applied research and the development of solutions to real-world organisational challenges.
“We want to bring research closer to the real challenges faced by organisations, creating the conditions for knowledge developed in academia to translate into practical solutions in Operations Management and Business Analytics,” says João Nuno Gonçalves, Director of the Centre for Operations and Business Analytics and lecturer at Católica Porto SBE.
The initiative comes at a time when data analytics and artificial intelligence are transforming the way organisations manage resources, plan operations and make decisions. The challenge also lies in translating scientific knowledge into practical applications that have a tangible impact on business operations.
The launch conference featured a keynote address by Pedro Amorim, Full Professor at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto and co-founder of LTPlabs, on the challenges of turning scientific knowledge into impact. This was followed by a panel discussion on the relationship between universities and businesses in the fields of operations and analytics.
Topics discussed included the contribution of research to transforming business operations, the use of data and artificial intelligence in decision-making, and the conditions required to develop joint projects between academia and the business community.
The new centre forms part of Católica Porto SBE’s strategy to bring research closer to the needs of organisations. It joins other initiatives dedicated to strengthening these links, including the Fórum de Ética, the Centre for Impact in Global Management (CIGMA) and the Centre for Leadership Development (CLeaD).
