Supply Chain Technology and Systems
Learn how technology is used in supply chain systems from fundamental concepts to innovative applications - part of the MITx Supply Chain Management MicroMasters Credential.
Course Information
Certificate Track
Learn for Free
About this Course
Supply chains have a long history of leveraging technology to drive efficiency and effectiveness, operating at a global scale that requires seamless integration across multiple systems and platforms. This course prepares you to translate fundamental supply chain principles into practice within a rapidly evolving digital landscape by focusing on core technological concepts, system architectures, and data-driven decision-making rather than specific software tools.
Through hands-on exercises, case studies, and real-world applications, you'll develop competencies in analyzing large supply chain datasets, evaluating and selecting enterprise supply chain software systems, managing technology implementation and upgrades, and assessing emerging technology expected to transform supply chain operations. By the end of this course, you'll be equipped to generate insights from big data, evaluate technology solutions, and make informed decisions that enhance supply chain performance.
Supply Chain Technology and Systems: SC4x is an instructor-paced course. Course content is released on a weekly basis, and a comprehensive syllabus, deadlines, and requirements are provided in Week 0 of the course.
This Supply Chain Technology and Systems course is part of the MITx MicroMasters Credential in Supply Chain Management (SCM), offered by the top-ranked SCM Master's program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This is an open enrollment course, making it accessible for almost anyone, anywhere in the world to enroll and learn for free.
What you'll learn
- Apply fundamental data analysis concepts to large supply chain datasets, including data modeling, database design, and query optimization
- Use Structured Query Language (SQL) to extract and manipulate supply chain data from relational databases
- Implement and interpret Machine Learning models to support supply chain decision-making
- Evaluate key enterprise supply chain software systems (ERP, WMS, TMS) and understand their functionality, integration, and business value
- Navigate software selection processes, implementation strategies, and system upgrade considerations
- Assess emerging technologies and digital trends shaping the future of supply chain management
Meet your instructors
Christopher Cassa
Lecturer, Supply Chain Management Program
Dr. Cassa is a Lecturer at the MIT Supply Chain Management Program where he directs courses on databases, data science, and machine learning. He currently teaches “Databases and Data Analysis for Supply Chain Management” in the Fall and “Data Science for Supply Chain Management” in the Spring in the SCMr program. Along with Dr. Caplice, he also teaches SC4x in the MITx MicroMasters credential in Supply Chain Management.
He actively uses data science in his research, and holds appointments as an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and the Brigham and Women’s Hospital Division of Genetics. Dr. Cassa is also a research affiliate of the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. He holds a S.B. and M.Eng from MIT and a PhD from the Harvard/MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology in Bioinformatics and Integrative Genomics.
