Research

Olumurejiwa (Mureji) Fatunde is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Operations Management and Statistics research group within the Rotman School of Management at University of Toronto, where she is advised by Professor Gonzalo Romero.

In her research, she leverages data-driven methods to improve decision-making in resource-constrained settings. Her research interests include informal supply chains, public sector decision-making, and business model innovation to achieve social objectives. Her work leverages methods from diverse fields including operations research, statistics, computer science, and economics, and she increasingly applies machine learning methods such as natural language processing to operations challenges. She hopes that her work will help companies, governments, and other organizations—especially those in emerging markets—improve their performance in order to better serve customers and society.

Mureji received a PhD in Operations Management & Decision Sciences from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2022 under the supervision of Professor Joann de Zegher. In the past, she has worked on initiatives related to improving public health supply chains in West Africa. She holds an undergraduate degree in Biomedical Engineering from Harvard University and an MSc in International Health Policy (Health Economics) from the London School of Economics.

Journal publications & working papers

The Value of Long-term Relationships when Selling to Informal Retailers - Evidence from India
Attempts to distribute durable, life-improving goods to customers at the Base of the Pyramid (BoP) – the more than three billion customers who live on less than

Supply Chain Relationship Resilience at the Base of the Pyramid: Evidence from India, with Andre Calmon, Joann de Zegher, and Gonzalo Romero.

-Selected as runner-up for the 2021 POMS College of Sustainable Operations Student Paper Award

-Status: Major Revision at Manufacturing & Service Operations Management

In-progress research

A data-driven approach to assortment planning for collective-intelligence crowdsourcing contests with heterogenous participant motivations, with Gonzalo Romero.

Socially optimal product mix selection for manufacturing of health commodities in Africa, with Isabelle Rao, Gonzalo Romero, and Prashant Yadav.