OPTIMIZATION MODEL TO SUPPORT THE MAKING DECISIONS OF CUSTOMER AND INVENTORIES’ ASSIGNMENT IN THE LOGISTICS NETWORK OF A CHEMICAL SECTOR COMPANY

Abstract

A manufacturing company distribution network is studied which represents activities
that do not add value like repetitive and unnecessary dispatches between warehouses, product´s
warehousing where there is not rotation, customer’s attention´s from distribution centers located
too far apart. The inefficiencies impact the operational costs of the supply and distribution system
in customer service reaching levels of 17% of the logistic cost over the sales compared with the
6% expected by the company. The general objective is to optimize the operational costs of
inventory and distribution through a linear model with exact solution that allows the customer´s
assignment and inventories to the respective warehouses. The literature models reviewed allow us
to find which customers are served from each open warehouses, taking into account warehouses´ capacities, fulfilling the demand, minimizing the operating costs and customer assignment. From
the right warehouses’ assignment to minimize the operate costs, it is necessary to find the total
demand´s amount required to satisfy, taking into account the cost to deliver the customer´s
products, respecting warehouse´s capacities, dispatches between distributions centers and
minimizing the unit cost to satisfy the customer´s zones.