The last few years have witnessed a previously unparalleled growth in the importance of optimization in business and industry. In contrast to the traditional view of optimization as too academic or theoretical to be relevant, organizations in all sectors of the economy as pursuing optimization as a way to improve their operations and strategic plans.

An evident contribution to this turn-around comes from advances in computer and information technology.

Consulting and service companies are engaged in aggressive competition to provide improved decision support systems. Enterprises large and small are finding that optimization "works", which in turn has sparked an accelerating pace of acceptance as firms seek to emulate the success of their competitors who are applying optimization successfully.

Optimization has also increasingly made its way into business and engineering practice through the quality and supply chain planning movements. High visibility companies in electronics, automobile manufacturing, data base design, telecommunications, financial services, air freight and passenger transport, chemical products — to mention only a few — are not only benefiting from optimization but are actively publicizing their use of it. The financial impact of this change is also spreading rapidly. As one example, the area of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), which is energetically pursuing optimization, is growing nearly 40% per year and is projected to have revenues exceeding $50 billion by 2002.) As a result, optimization has progressed from an academic abstraction to become a familiar part of everyday life.

The Hearin Center for Enterprise Science, whose members include international recognized leaders, that have pioneered numbers real world applications in the optimization field, is devoted to making optimization accessible to organizations that want to improve their performance and marketplace competitiveness.