Séminaire conjoint CRT-Chaire de recherche du Canada en distributique

TITRE : Heuristics for Stochastic Inventory Routing Problems

CONFÉRENCIER : Lars Magnus Hvattum, Molde University College, Norway

DATE et ENDROIT : 17 mars 2006, 10h30, salle 3521, Pavillon André-Aisenstadt, Campus de l'Université de Montréal

RESPONSABLE : Gilbert Laporte (343-6143)

RÉSUMÉ : In the business practice called vendor managed inventory replenishment (VMI) the vendor decides when to make deliveries to its customers, how much to deliver, and how to combine the shipments using the available equipment, e.g., trucks. This gives rise to the Inventory Routing Problem, in which the goal is to coordinate inventory replenishment and transportation in order to minimize costs. We look at a Stochastic Inventory Routing Problem, where the stochastic demands of the customers are specified through general discrete distributions, and where the overall problem is formulated as a discounted, infinite-horizon Markov Decision Process. Heuristic solution methods, including variations of GRASP and Progressive Hedging, are then proposed, based on using finite scenario trees to approximate the Markov Decision Process.