David Cohen Solis

When Panama native David Cohen Solis graduated with a law degree from New York University, he might not have expected a logistics degree from an Atlanta school to play such a long-term role in his career.

But two years after graduating from NYU, Mr. Cohen traded law for logistics when he joined the family business, a hardware wholesaler and distributor now known as International Hardware Corp.

Teaming up with his three older brothers and father, he tackled the challenge of managing the company’s growing distribution to its retail centers throughout Panama.  

He soon found that what he learned for the courtroom didn’t necessarily translate to the warehouse.

“As time passed and our business grew, the logistics part of our business was getting more complicated,” he told GlobalAtlanta by phone from Panama.

So began a quest for knowledge on how to better manage the company’s supply chain.  In 2005, he discovered the Executive Masters in International Logistics, an 18-month program started in 1999 by the Atlanta-based Georgia Institute of Technology.

Now, 15 years since his professional switch, Mr. Cohen sees the executive master’s, also known as EMIL, as the keystone in his logistics education, and the investment keeps on giving.

“In today’s global market, logistics takes more relevance each day,” he said.

It has also been key in landing Mr. Cohen some important positions.

He was recently named president of the Colon Free Zone User’s Association, a business group representing companies with operations in what is the second largest free trade zone in the world behind Hong Kong. 

Located in the city of Colon near a railroad terminal and three container ports at the Atlantic gateway to the Panama Canal, the zone facilitated $16 billion in total trade last year, and that number is expected to grow along with infrastructure improvements.

As director of operations for International Hardware, Mr. Cohen oversees a 250,000-square-foot distribution center there.  From that base, the company exports goods brought in from China to some 25 countries mostly around Latin America and the Caribbean.

It also imports products from the U.S. to sell in the 11 Do-It Center retail home improvement outlets International Hardware owns in Panama. 

Mr. Cohen was scheduled to finish the EMIL degree in September 2006, but his daughter’s birth postponed his final degree requirements until this June. He will visit Atlanta next week for the last of five required residences, intensive two-week EMIL required courses held in venues all over the world.

The first and last of these sessions are held on Georgia Tech’s main campus in Atlanta, with visits to Asia, Europe and Latin America in between. 

The EMIL program, operated by the renowned School of Industrial Systems and Engineering, is geared toward working executives in large companies looking to improve their global supply chain efficiency.

It started almost a decade ago, when founder and current Executive Director John Vande Vate had the vision to create a program with international logistics as the specific niche.

“It was a little foresight on his part to predict what global markets were going to become and the significant role that supply chain professionals would be asked to perform by CEOs and companies,” said Greg Andrews, EMIL’s managing director.

About half the students enrolled in the program already have MBAs.  They’re usually experienced professionals in high-level management positions.  The average student is 42 and has 15-17 years of experience, Mr. Andrews said.

Instead of requiring a master’s thesis, the EMIL program puts students to work on an 18-month, real-world global supply chain project for one of its sponsoring companies. 

That way, students and their companies benefit from the knowledge they gain, and sponsors see returns on their investment usually greater than $1-2 million, Mr. Andrews said. 

For Georgia Tech, the program carries the added benefit of improving the school’s visibility with future leaders of top companies.

For International Hardware, the hands-on global experience afforded by the program has been invaluable, Mr. Cohen said. 

“Definitely the volume and the way of managing the flow that we have now would have been impossible or much more difficult if I hadn’t had the course, and not the course only but also the tools I learned there,” he said.

Residences in Asia and Europe taught him how to better coordinate operations in other countries, where cultural and legal structures for logistics can be tricky.

Mr. Cohen also invited the program to use his company as one of its many case studies.  Students helped coordinate design and construction of International Hardware’s new distribution center, which was completed in 2006.

EMIL now travels to Panama for a residence session, thanks in part to Mr. Cohen’s influence and participation.

Mr. Andrews said the program’s success there and projects associated with the Panama Canal and the Colon Free Zone ensure that Panama will stay the preferred location for that residence. 

Georgia Tech is considering establishing a degree program at some level in Panama through its Supply Chain & Logistics Institute.