Recognized: Tec professor wins award at engineering congress in Canada

Boris C. Herbas-Torrico, a research professor at the Tec’s School of Engineering and Sciences (EIC), has won two international awards for his research on productive efficiency and technological adoption in emerging economies.

He won these awards at the World Congress on Industrial Engineering and Operations Management (IEOM), which took place in Windsor, Canada.

This award-winning research, in which Herbas-Torrico is listed as the lead author, addresses critical challenges for emerging economies: from service digitalization to the optimization of highly complex manufacturing processes.

The first research project is titled: “Enhancing Safety Fuse Manufacturing Productivity” and it won the Best Track Paper award in the Business Management and Operations Management category.

The second provides a technology overview: adoption of delivery applications across Latin America, which won second place in the Supply Chain and Logistics Competition.

Industrial optimization

Herbas-Torrico is a research professor in the Industrial Engineering department at Tec Guadalajara. This IOEM congress took place at the University of Windsor.

The academic said that, in his opinion, there were two key factors that led to these projects standing out:

1. Industrial optimization: 25% more productivity without additional investment

Entitled “Enhancing Safety Fuse Manufacturing Productivity”, the project was developed in collaboration with a leading multinational company in the explosives industry.

The key, according to Herbas-Torrico, was based on applying principles of factory physics and simulation techniques.

“These studies don’t just provide new knowledge; they also offer practical solutions that increase efficiency.”

The results were:

• Increased productivity by 25% on one of the production lines
• Significantly reduced waiting times and the amount of products in process
• Achieving these improvements without additional capital investment by simply optimizing existing resources

“These studies don’t just provide new knowledge, they also offer practical solutions that increase the efficiency and competitiveness of real organizations,” said the researcher from Tec Guadalajara.

“First, you must have the data, then you model it, and then you evaluate whether the results are worthy of publication. If so, then you select a suitable journal or conference where you would like to send it,” the academic explained.

“And then the summary, the abstract, is submitted. If it is accepted, the process begins, which takes approximately five months depending on the conference, so you start to write it up. This is research carried out over at least two and a half years,” he said.

2. Technology overview: Adoption of delivery applications

The second award-winning research project won second place in the Supply Chain and Logistics Competition and is titled “Adoption of Delivery Applications in Bolivia.”

It analyzed how and why users in emerging economies decide to use digital delivery platforms.

The research team found that, for these technologies to succeed in Latin America, technical functionality alone is not enough. 

The determining factors found in the study include:

• Security and connectivity: availability of secure payment methods and a reliable connection are pillars for accelerating adoption.
• Social Innovation: elements such as artificial intelligence, gamification, and social influence play a crucial role in user decisions.
• Legal infrastructure: the country’s regulatory framework is a determining factor for the growth of these digital ecosystems.

“In the logistics research, the challenge to overcome was that I was no longer in Bolivia and I had to work remotely with my co-researchers and six students who were working with me,” said Herbas-Torrico.

“So, one of the challenges was coordinating all those aspects of reviewing progress, modeling, data collection, and preparing the tools from here.”

Applied research

All things considered, he said, “These awards reflect Tec de Monterrey’s commitment to applied research that generates real impact and scalable solutions for international contexts.”

“In the Factory Physics research, our biggest achievement was having intertwined two completely different methodologies where they had never been intertwined before, which has a future,” said the researcher.

“I’m now working with another Ph.D. student from the Tec to implement it in Mexico and other countries to develop this methodology further; it can even be intertwined with artificial intelligence, which has opened the field to more analysis,” he concluded.

He said he was “happy at the recognition; but it isn’t the first award I’ve ever received. I already have awards that were given to me in Japan.”

“I’m fortunate to have received many awards since I was a student. So, I have experience with that, but yes, it’s always a joy; it’s further validation that you’re doing your job well,” he concluded.

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