Editorial Introduction

This is a special issue of the Brazilian Journal of Operations and Production Management that presents some of the best papers of the International Conference on Production Research - ICPR Americas 2006. The third edition of the ICPR was held in Curitiba, Brazil, from 30th July to 2nd August, 2006. The general theme of the conference was Rethinking Operation Systems: New Roles of Technology, Strategy and Organization in Americas’ Integration Era. The event was organized by the Brazilian Association of Production Engineering (ABEPRO), and the Industrial & Systems Engineering Graduate Program (PPGEPS) of the Pontifi cal Catholic University of Paraná (PUCPR). Besides these organizations, the event was also sponsored by the International Foundation for Production Research (IFPR), Federação da Indústrias do Estado do Paraná (FIEP), Universidade da Indústria (UNINDUS), Banco do Brasil, Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), FESTO, HSBC, Revista PM, and Conselho Regional de Engenharia, Arquitetura e Agronomia do Paraná (CREA-PR). About 200 papers were submitted coming from Americas and abroad. The conference received papers from Argentina, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, England, France, Germany, Japan, Mexico, Portugal, Russia, Turkey and United States. This confi rmed the success and the growing prestige this event is getting among worldwide community. A double-blind review process selected around 100 papers for oral presentations (allocated in 5 technical sessions) and 30 papers as posters. Among them, best ones were selected and the authors were invited to submit a more robust article. Then, these papers were double-blind reviewed and some of those that achieved the higher marks were selected to be part of this issue