Framework in The Formulation and Solution of Inventory Routing Problems

Researchers who investigate in fields relate with optimization problems in Supply Chain (SC), in special those that involve the process of inventory and its distribution, find difficulties to relate the knowledge areas such as operation research and computer science, organizing the procedure and evaluating the solutions obtained. After analyzed this problem, a simple framework has been developed to use in the searching of near-optimal solutions in the field of Inventory Routing Problems (IRP). In this paper this framework is described in detail, and all the phases to follow are introduced step by step. Although some of these phases can be extended for other type of optimization problem in the SC, the literature of this study is focused in IRP. This field has been chosen due to its importance in the real world, and its great relevance in the literature. The use of benchmark instances for evaluating of results is highlighted and these instances are organized according the concrete problem where are used. Also, it is presented some key elements to face the problem such as the information management, relationship of inventory policies with the demand information, demand and lead time modeling and optimization methods. These elements are organized and classified for ease of use.