Development and Application of Multi Commodity Multi Location Integrated Model for Manufacturing Industry

This paper presented the development and application of Linear Programming to the modeling of Multi-Commodity Multi-Location production-distribution model for manufacturing industry. The Manufacturing industry has two plants, three depots and twenty retailer’s axis in Lagos. The products are based on how they are packaged; Product 1(P1), Product 2(P2), Product 3(P3) and Product 4(P4). TORA software is used in analyzing the data obtained from the company. Comparing the optimal Multi-Commodity Multi-Location transportation cost of One trillion, Five Hundred And Thirty Billion And Four Hundred And Ninety Million Naira to existing transportation cost of truckload Three Trillion, Five Hundred And Forty Four Billion Naira, the difference is Two Trillion, Thirteen Billion And Five Hundred And Ten Million Naira which is Four Hundred And Two Billion And Seven Hundred And Two Million Naira annually resulting to 56.82 percent gain in profit.

Optimizing the geodetic networks based on the distances between the net points and the project border

Geodetic networks are important for most engineering projects. Generally, a geodetic network is designed according to precision, reliability, and cost criteria. This paper provides a new criterion considering the distances between the Net Points (NPs) and the Project Border (PB) in terms of Neighboring (N). Optimization based on the N criterion seeks to relocate the NPs as close as possible to PB, which leads to creating shorter distances between NPs or those distances linking NPs with Target Points (TPs) to be measured inside PB. These short distances can improve the precision of NPs and increase the accuracy of observations and transportation costs between NPs themselves or between NPs and TPs (in real applications). Three normalized N objective functions based on L1, L2, and L∞‒norms were formulated to build the corresponding N optimization models, NL1; NL2; and NL∞ and to determine the best solution. Each model is subjected to safety, precision, reliability, and cost constraints. The feasibility of the N criterion is demonstrated by a simulated example. The results showed the ability of NL∞ to determine the safest positions for the NPs near PB. These new positions led to improving the precision of the network and preserving the initial reliability and observations cost, due to contradiction problems. Also, N results created by all N models demonstrate their theoretical feasibility in improving the accuracy of the observations and transportation cost between points. It is recommended to use multi-objective optimization models to overcome the contradiction problem and consider the real application to generalize the benefits of N models in designing the networks.

A Novel Enhanced Differential Evolution Algorithm for Outbound Logistics of the Poultry Industry in Thailand

Outbound logistics is a crucial field of logistics management. This study considers a planning distribution for the poultry industry in Thailand. The goal of the study is to minimize the transportation cost for the multi-depot vehicle-routing problem (MDVRP). A novel enhanced differential evolution algorithm (RI-DE) is developed based on a new re-initialization mutation formula and a local search function. A mixed-integer programming formulation is presented in order to measure the performance of a heuristic with GA, PSO, and DE for small-sized instances. For large-sized instances, RI-DE is compared to the traditional DE algorithm for solving the MDVRP using published benchmark instances. The results demonstrate that RI-DE obtained a near-optimal solution of 99.03% and outperformed the traditional DE algorithm with a 2.53% relative improvement, not only in terms of solution performance, but also in terms of computational time.

Metaheuristic Algorithms Based on Compromise Programming for Multi-Objective Urban Shipment Problem

The Vehicle Routing Problem (VRP) and its variants are found in many fields, especially logistics. In this study, we introduced an adaptive method to a complex VRP. It combines multi-objective optimization and several forms of VRPs with practical requirements for an urban shipment system. The optimizer needs to consider terrain and traffic conditions. The proposed model also considers customers' expectations, shipper considerations as goals, and the common goal like transportation cost. We offered compromise programming to approach the multi-objective problem by decomposing the original multi-objective problem into a minimized distance-based problem. We designed a hybrid version of the Genetic algorithm with the Local Search algorithm to solve the proposed problem. We evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm with the Tabu Search algorithm, the original Genetic algorithm on the tested dataset. The results show that our method is an effective decision-making tool for the multi-objective VRP and an effective solver for the new variation of VRP.

On Multi-Objective Minimum Spanning Tree Problem under Uncertain Paradigm

Minimum spanning tree problem (MSTP) has allured many researchers and practitioners due to its varied range of applications in real world scenarios. Modelling these applications involves the incorporation of indeterminate phenomena based on their subjective estimations. Such phenomena can be represented rationally using uncertainty theory. Being a more realistic variant of MSTP, in this article, based on the principles of the uncertainty theory, we have studied a multi-objective minimum spanning tree problem (MMSTP) with indeterminate problem parameters. Subsequently, two uncertain programming models of the proposed uncertain multi-objective minimum spanning tree problem (UMMSTP) are developed and their corresponding crisp equivalence models are investigated, and eventually solved using a classical multi-objective solution technique, the epsilon-constraint method. Additionally, two multi-objective evolutionary algorithms (MOEAs), non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II (NSGAII) and duplicate elimination non-dominated sorting evolutionary algorithm (DENSEA) are also employed as solution methodologies. With the help of the proposed UMMSTP models, the practical problem of optimizing the distribution of petroleum products was solved, consisting in the search for symmetry (balance) between the transportation cost and the transportation time. Thereafter, the performance of the MOEAs is analyzed on five randomly developed instances of the proposed problem.

Yang Liuzhuang express drone application and development study

This paper presents a feasibility study on the application of delivery drones in Yang Liu Zhuang. In order to make the cost calculation convincing, the article realistically simulates the delivery scenario of Yang Liu Zhuang during the epidemic, and then analyzes its transportation cost in depth, and finally concludes that using drones to partially replace traditional delivery in Yang Liu Zhuang can save costs and improve logistics efficiency. However, at present, the delivery by express drones is mainly limited by their own load weight, and they cannot deliver medium and large goods.

Two-Player Location-Price Game in a Spoke Market with Linear Transportation Cost

This paper investigates the location game of two players in a spoke market with linear transportation cost. A spoke market model has been proposed, which is inspired by the Hotelling model and develops two-player games in price competition. Using two-stage (position and price) patterns and the backward guidance method, the existence of price and location equilibrium results for the position games is proved.

The Role of Transport in Reverse Distribution Chains

Reverse distribution operations have become significant to the manufacturers in supporting the firms to achieve the circularity of products in the reverse flow chains. There are four main components of the reverse distribution chains; inbound and outbound transportation, collection of returns, centralised returns centres, and recovery process. Transport is essential by reducing the lead time and transportation cost of the used and the recovered products. Therefore, it is pertinent that the manufacturers continue endeavouring for the sustainable transportation process in each of the components to ensure the success of the reverse distribution chains.