A very large scale neighborhood (VLSN) search algorithm for an inventory- routing problem (original) (raw)
An inventory-routing problem is one of combinatorial optimization problems that are very difficult to solve to optimality. The inventory-routing system considered is composed of a central warehouse and a set of suppliers who produce non-identical items. The items are kept at the central warehouse and face constant and deterministic demands. An inventory policy with fixed order quantity is adopted. When a group of items need to be replenished, a capacitated vehicle is dispatched from the central warehouse to collect them at suppliers' locations. In this paper, constructive heuristics and an improvement algorithm called a very large scale neighborhood (VLSN) search algorithm are presented. The constructive heuristics sequentially generate an initial feasible solution. Then, a VLSN search algorithm is applied to improve the solution by searching very large neighborhoods. Computational results indicate that the VLSN search algorithm can provide near-optimal solutions very efficiently.
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