A column generation based approach for an integrated production and transportation scheduling problem with dual delivery modes

ABSTRACT

3D printing technology is fundamentally transforming how companies are run and managed today. This work analyzes the problem of integrated production and transportation of automotive spare parts in the context of 3D printing. We consider two sets of customers – scheduled and breakdown maintenance – serviced by the same resource but with distinct delivery modes. We propose a mixed-integer programming (MIP) formulation for optimally solving small problem instances. We develop an exact approach based on column generation (CG) for large cases by reformulating the MIP model as a set-covering problem through Dantzig-Wolfe decomposition. We design and deploy two acceleration strategies for the quicker convergence of the CG approach. Through extensive computational experiments, we establish the superiority and suitability of the proposed solution methodology for solving real-life problems at terse computational times.

KEYWORDS:

• Scheduling
• integrated production and transportation
• dual delivery modes
• column generation
• acceleration strategy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data used to support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author by request.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Kunpeng Li

Kunpeng Li received the B.E. degree in Mechanical Engineering and Automation from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China, in 2001, and Ph.D. degree in Systems Engineering and Management from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, in 2006. He is currently a Professor in School of Management, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China. His current research interests include production operation management, scheduling, and supply chain management.

Peiyang He

Peiyang He received the Ph.D. degree in Management science and Engineering from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China, in 2021. She is currently a Lecturer in School of Management and Economics, North China University of Water Resources and Electric Power. Her current research interests include combinatorial optimisation, integrated production and transportation scheduling, and supply chain management.

P. N. Ram Kumar

P N Ram Kumar is a Professor in the QM & OM area at the Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode. His research interests are in the broad areas of transportation network optimisation, Military logistics and scheduling. His work has been published in reputed journals such as Transportation Research Part E, Annals of Operations Research, International Journal of Production Research, and Journal of Scheduling, to name a few.