Description:

Abstract

Since the emergence of airline revenue management in the early 1980s, commercial aviation has provided a compelling case study of how data, optimization, regulatory policy, and customer behavior reshape complex markets. This presentation reflects on the evolution of airline decision systems over the past four decades, highlighting major innovations driven by technological advances, competitive pressures, and shifting consumer expectations. What began as simple, rule-based seat controls has evolved into network-level decision systems that integrate pricing, demand, competition, and customer choice.

The presentation examines several key paradigm shifts, including the transition from leg-based to path-based decision making, the incorporation of behavioral models into operational systems, and the ongoing move toward continuous pricing, dynamic offers, and bundled products. While these advances promise greater flexibility and economic efficiency, they also introduce fundamental challenges related to scale, coordination, and real-time decision making in highly dynamic markets.

The presentation highlights the role of the Air Transportation Lab at Georgia Tech (ATL@GT) as a pre-competitive research hub that brings together more than ten industry partners to advance foundational research at the intersection of economics, analytics, and operations. It concludes by outlining a forward-looking research agenda for the next decade, positioning aviation as a blueprint for designing scalable market mechanisms in complex, data-rich systems, including emerging forms of air mobility.
 

Bio 

Laurie A. Garrow is Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Aerospace Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology, where she serves as Director of the Air Transportation Lab (ATL@GT) and Co-Director of the Center for Urban and Regional Air Mobility (CURAM). Her research integrates advanced travel-demand modeling, discrete choice methods, and market analytics to advance understanding of customer behavior and emerging transportation markets, including advanced air mobility. Her doctoral research won prizes from INFORMS and IATBR, and she is a recipient of an NSF CAREER Award, the CUTC-ARTBA New Faculty Member Award, and the ASCE Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize for sustained contributions to transportation systems research.

Dr. Garrow is a recognized leader in the transportation and operations research communities. She has served as President of AGIFORS - as the first woman and first two-term President in the organization’s 60-year history - as well as Vice President of Societies and Sections for INFORMS, and in numerous leadership roles across TRB and INFORMS committees. A dedicated educator, Dr. Garrow has received multiple institute-level teaching awards and has mentored graduate students who have collectively earned more than 30 prestigious national fellowships, including Fulbright, NSF, Eisenhower, ACRP, and Eno awards. She is frequently interviewed by national and international media, including CNN, The Washington Post, USA Today, People Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, BBC, and Bloomberg, and has authored invited op-ed pieces for Barron’s and Scientific American.

Dr. Garrow lives in Atlanta, Georgia, with her husband, Mike, and their three rescue cats: PeaPod, Smuckers, and Shadow.