In a recent paper, Fisher et al. (2001) present a method tomitigate end-effects in lot sizing by including a valuation term for end-of-horizon inventory in the objective function of the short-horizon model. Computational tests show that the proposed method outperforms the Wagner-Whitin algorithm...

We consider a model for a serial supply chain in which production, inventory, and transportation decisions are integrated, in the presence of production capacities and for different transportation cost functions. The model we study is a generalization of the traditional single-item economic...

The textbook Dantzig-Wolfe decomposition for the Capacitated Lot Sizing Problem (CLSP),as already proposed by Manne in 1958, has an important structural deficiency. Imposingintegrality constraints on the variables in the full blown master will not necessarily give theoptimal IP solution as only...

A single-machine multiproduct manufacturing system with random breakdowns and random repair times is considered. Under a weak capacity condition on the system it is shown that the total work-in-progress (WIP) is a recurrent stochastic process. By replacing the stochastic model by a deterministic...

A single machine processing different types of parts is considered. Switching from one type to another involves a setup time. The part types may have different processing times. The resulting scheduling problem is treated as a dynamical system for which several feedback policies that are...

An approximation for the fill rate, i.e. the percentage of demand being delivered from inventory on hand immediately, is derived for items in a periodic review inventory control system with lost sales. We assume demand is stochastic and discrete, lead times are positive and replenishments are...

Two heuristics based on branch and bound (B&B) are developed to solve closed-loop material requirements planning (MRP) lot-sizing problems that have general product structures and variable costs. A “look ahead method'’(LAM) heuristic allows for variable production/purchasing costs and uses a...

The research on lot sizing is extensive; however, no author in the literature reviewed to date provides an optimal solution algorithm to a prevalent problem which is found in manufacturing. A multi-level, general product-structure, variable-cost model is presented which follows the procedure of a...

In this paper we consider the capacitated lot-sizing problem (CLSP) with linear costs. It is known that this problem is NP-hard, but there exist special cases that can be solved in polynomial time. We derive a backward algorithm, based on the forward algorithm by Chen et al. (1994), to solve the...