A new model for location routing problem with considering time windows and inventory control decisions

this paper for the first time presents a novel model to simultaneously optimize plant location, inventory and vehicle routing with time windows decisions in a supply chain system.The problem addressed in this study is a many-to-one distribution network. Consisting of an assembly plant and manydistinct suppliers where each supplies a distinct product. We consider a finite horizon, multi-periods and multi-products where a fleet of capacitated homogeneous vehicles, transport products from the suppliers to meet the demand specified by the assembly plant with considering time windows of suppliers and assemblyplant in each period. The demand for each product is deterministic and time varying. The objective is to minimize the inventory carrying costs at assembly plant and total transportation costs over the planning horizon. We propose a novel mixed integer linear programming (MILP) model for this problem and CPLEX 12.3 MILP solver is invoked to optimize the problem.

Keywords:

vehicle routing , facility location , inventory control , time windows , supply chain management , mathematical programming