Integration of production sequencing and outbound logistics in the automotive industry

This paper addresses the mixed model assembly line sequencing and outbound logistics planning problems in the automotive industry at the operational level. The decision-making procedures in practice consider these two problems sequentially. This study proposes an integrated scheme coordinating both decisions. We provide mixed integer programming models for production sequencing, logistics planning, and the integrated scheme. The integrated model is simplified based on an understanding of the properties of an optimal solution for the sequencing problem and based on the assumption that there is one closed bottleneck workstation. The numerical experiments demonstrate the benefit of the integration by comparing it with two sequential schemes, the Production-First-Scheme and the Logistics-First-Scheme.