Scheduling in Supply Chains Using Mixed Integer Programming

Supply chain management is a rapidly developing field within management science and operations research, and this book presents a unified, systematic, and practical approach to applying mixed integer programming (MIP) modeling and solutions to integrated scheduling in customer driven supply chains. Two main decision-making approaches are discussed, compared, and illustrated with computational examples (modeled on real-world supply chains) throughout the book: the integrated (simultaneous) approach, in which all required decisions are made simultaneously using complex, monolithic MIP models and the hierarchical (sequential) approach, in which the required decisions are made successively, using hierarchies of simpler and smaller size MIP models. The book is divided into three parts: Part I (Chapters 1 to 4) considers short term scheduling, presents various MIP models, and provides some heuristic algorithms for detailed scheduling in flexible flowshops and general flexible assembly systems; Part II (Chapters 5 to 10) focuses on medium term decision-making in supply chains and presents MIP models and some MIP-based heuristic algorithms for supplier selection, customer order acceptance, due date setting, as well as the corresponding aggregate scheduling and rescheduling of orders in make-to-order discrete manufacturing environment; and Part III (Chapters 11 to 14) focuses on coordinated scheduling of the manufacturing and supply of parts and assembly of finished products and provides MIP models for a single or multiple objective decision making.