Decision Science: The Systems Behind Billion-Dollar Site Selection with Ramya Gowda
From Problem Solved: The IISE Podcast by Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers
April 14, 2026 · 30 min · Season 6 · Episode 17
About this episode
This episode features Ramya Gowda discussing the systems and decision science behind billion-dollar site selection for companies.
Decision Science: The Systems Behind Billion-Dollar Site Selection with Ramya Gowda When companies decide where to build, expand, or relocate, that single decision shapes everything that follows - hiring, productivity, supply chains, cost, and long-term risk. But how do organizations actually make those decisions? In this episode of Problem Solved , we sit down with Ramya Gowda, Managing Director at Newmark, where she leads strategic consulting in site selection, location strategy, and labor analytics. Ramya helps global corporations evaluate potential locations and make some of the most consequential decisions in their organizations. Using industrial and systems engineering principles, Ramya and her team apply decision science, data modeling, and systems thinking to compare locations across hundreds of factors, from workforce availability and infrastructure to logistics networks, environments, and long-term resilience. In this conversation, you’ll learn: • How companies evaluate potential locations for manufacturing plants, offices, and data centers • Why site selection is really an upstream systems decision that affects everything downstream • How decision models translate…
People in this episode
Host: Elizabeth Grimes
Guest: Ramya Gowda
Topics covered
- decision science
- site selection
- location strategy
- industrial engineering
- data modeling
Keywords
- manufacturing
- offices
- data centers
- workforce availability
- infrastructure
- logistics networks
- long-term resilience
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