INTEC   05402
INSTITUTO DE DESARROLLO TECNOLOGICO PARA LA INDUSTRIA QUIMICA
Unidad Ejecutora - UE
artículos
Título:
The Multi-Echelon Vehicle Routing Problem with Cross-Docking in Supply Chain Management
Autor/es:
DONDO, RODOLFO; MENDEZ, CARLOS; CERDÁ, JAIME
Revista:
COMPUTERS AND CHEMICAL ENGINEERING
Editorial:
PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD
Referencias:
Año: 2011 vol. 35 p. 3002 - 3024
ISSN:
0098-1354
Resumen:
Multi-echelon distribution networks are quite common in supply chain and logistics. Deliveries of multiple items from factories to customers are managed by routing and consolidating shipments in intermediate facilities, called warehouses, carrying on long-term product inventories. On the other hand, cross-docking is a relatively new logistics technique that differs from warehousing because intermediate depots no longer store products. Instead, they just consolidate incoming shipments based on customer demands and subsequently transfer them to the shipping dock for delivery to their destinations. Such activities are known as cross-docking operations. Moreover, customer orders are now placed at the origin of the network, usually a factory or a major distribution center. Hybrid strategies that combine direct shipping, warehousing and cross-docking are usually applied in real-world distribution systems, with the choice depending on the product type and the customer location. This work deals with the operational management of hybrid multi-echelon multi-item distribution systems. Attention is not only focused on facility utilization and material flow assignment between levels but also on detailed vehicle routes and schedules. The goal of the so-called N-echelon vehicle routing problem with cross-docking in supply chain management (the VRPCD-SCM problem) consists of satisfying customer demands at minimum total transportation cost while meeting vehicle capacity, product availability and time window constraints. A new monolithic optimization framework for the VRPCD-SCM problem based on a mixed-integer linear mathematical formulation is presented. Computational results for several problem instances involving up to one factory, three intermediate facilities and 28 final destinations under different scenarios are reported. The approach shows a very good computational performance and all examples were solved to optimality in a quite reasonable CPU time.