Dr. David Michael is a highly accomplished optimization engineer with more than three decades of experience designing, implementing, and deploying large-scale optimization and decision-support systems across aviation, logistics, supply chain, and complex industrial operations. With a Ph.D. in Operations Research and a career that spans both advanced research and mission-critical production environments, Dr. Michael brings exceptional depth and credibility to the field of optimization engineering.

As an optimization engineer, Dr. Michael specializes in transforming complex operational and business challenges into mathematically rigorous models that drive real-world performance improvements. His work has encompassed a wide range of applications, including airline schedule planning, airline crew planning, instructor and workforce scheduling, supply chain planning and scheduling, and warehouse sorter reconfiguration. These projects have ranged from very large-scale planning models requiring hours of computation to highly time-sensitive operational models that must generate optimal or near-optimal solutions in seconds.

Dr. Michael’s approach as an optimization engineer consistently begins with deep problem discovery. He works closely with stakeholders to investigate, define, and document the underlying business objectives, constraints, and tradeoffs. From there, he formulates appropriate mathematical models and implements them in production-quality code using languages such as C++ and Java, integrated with industry-leading commercial solvers. His technical expertise includes advanced optimization techniques such as column generation, decomposition strategies, and extensive solver tuning to ensure scalability, robustness, and performance.

Most recently, Dr. Michael served as a Principal Research Scientist at Amazon, where he developed optimization models used in live production across fulfillment centers throughout North America. These models reconfigured warehouse sorting systems in near real time, running every 30 minutes under strict one-minute solution time constraints. He also developed optimization models for scheduling Amazon Air, supporting on-time package delivery across complex air networks in Europe and India.

Earlier in his career, Dr. Michael held senior optimization engineering roles at Southwest Airlines, Sabre, i2 Technologies, and IBM, contributing to mission-critical systems in airline scheduling, revenue management, and global supply chain planning. He earned his Ph.D. in Operations Research from North Carolina State University, along with a Master’s degree in Statistics and a Bachelor’s degree in Systems Analysis from Miami University (Ohio). Dr. Michael is a co-inventor on three software patents and has also served as an adjunct faculty member teaching graduate-level algorithms.

With his rare combination of academic rigor, software engineering expertise, and hands-on operational experience, Dr. Michael exemplifies the role of a senior optimization engineer capable of solving some of the most complex optimization challenges faced by modern organizations.

See a case study of Dr. Michael’s optimization engineering

To work with Senior Optimization Engineer Dr. Michael, please visit our quote page and request him in the description area.