A planning method for the integrated production and outbound distribution scheduling problem

由于全球市场上的竞争形势，公司被迫将重点放在核心竞争力上，并与供应链中的专业合作伙伴密切合作。这些合作伙伴往往有着不同且相互冲突的目标。因此，只有内部流程优化，而不是整个供应链的优化计划结果。集成计划是一种供应链管理概念，它使供应链范围内的优化能够达到总体目标。在本研究方案中，将开发一种用于集成生产和出厂配送计划问题的集成计划方法。现有的这一领域的计划方法大多是面向生产或运输的，这两个子问题的集成程度较低。因此，需要为解决集成计划问题提供概念和方法上的支持。本研究方案的目标是开发一种新的集成水平高、绩效提高的供应链重点部分的集成计划方法。为实现这一目标，确定了发展综合规划方法的两个不同战略和若干里程碑。在开始开发综合规划方法之前，需要生成一个基本的基本模型。现有的规划方法使用不同的基本模型，这妨碍了对总体规划结果的业绩指标进行竞争性比较。因此，第一个子目标是开发一个新的规划方法评估的基本模型，并与现有方法进行比较。进化算法的应用是发展综合规划方法的第一个策略。将使用生产调度和运输计划中已知的方法来生成启动计划。进化算法基于该起始计划生成并优化备选方案，同时考虑到每个子问题的约束。对于备选方案的评价，需要一个合适的函数。第二种策略的主要特点是将生产调度和运输计划子问题进行多阶段分解，并为问题求解过程提供了一种新的结构。从集群开始，每个子问题将在每个集群中分别得到解决和优化。随后，进行了两步综合程序，以获得总体综合规划结果。最后，将使用基本模型对所开发的综合规划方法进行评估。此外，还将对综合规划结果的敏感性进行额外调查。

Companies are forced to concentrate on core competencies and a close collaboration with specialized partners in a supply chain due to the competitive situation on global markets. These partners often have different and conflictive goals. Thus, there is only an internal process optimisation and not an optimised planning result for the entire supply chain. Integrated planning is a supply chain management concept which enables a supply chain wide optimisation to reach the overall goals. In this research proposal an integrated planning method for the integrated production and outbound distribution planning problem will be developed. Most of the existing planning methods in this research field are production or transport oriented with a low integration level of these two sub-problems. Thus, there is a need for conceptual and methodological support for solving the integrated planning problem.The goal of this research proposal is the development of a new integrated planning method for the focused part of the supply chain with a high integration level and an improved performance. Two separate strategies for the development of integrated planning methods and a number of milestones are defined to reach this goal. Before the development of integrated planning methods will start, there is a need to generate a basic underlying model. The existing planning methods uses different underlying models, which prevents a competitive comparison of performance indicators of the overall planning results. Therefore, the first sub-goal is the development of a basic model for evaluation of new planning methods, which will be developed in this research project, and the comparison with existing methods.The application of evolutionary algorithms is the first strategy for the development of an integrated planning method. Already known methods from the production scheduling and from transportation planning will be used for generating a starting plan. The evolutionary algorithm generates and optimises alternative solutions based on this starting plan respecting the restriction of each sub-problem. For the evaluation of the alternative plans a suitable function is required.The main characteristics of the second strategy is a multistage decomposition of the sub-problems production scheduling and transportation planning and a new structure for the problem solving process. Starting with a clustering each sub-problem will be solved and optimised separately in each cluster. Subsequently, there is a two step integration procedure in order to obtain an overall integrated planning result. Finally, the integrated planning methods developed will be evaluated using the basic model. Furthermore, there will be additional investigations regarding sensitivity of integrated planning results.