Distribution and operation planning at a cross-dock platform: A case of study at Renault

The development of international sourcing and overseas flows are at the core of Renault´s supply chain strategy. In order to link distant assembly plants with suppliers, Renault relies on a worldwide network of cross-dock logistics platforms. These centers act both as information and physical consolidation point. In other words, from the point of view of an assembly plant, the logistic center performs as any other supplier. Thus, distribution and operation planning are carried out by the platform. At the shop-floor, inland deliveries are received, sorted, repacked (if needed) and loaded onto containers for overseas shipping. In this paper we present the current planning process at Renault platforms and we propose an alternative method which seeks to minimize transportation and internal resources costs, respecting storage capacity and time windows constraints. The system is modeled as an integer linear program and tested in CPLEX. Encouraging results obtained from numerical simulations led to a real-life implementation of a simplified version of the model. Our research not only responds to a specific industrial problem, but also tackles simultaneously two cross-docking research fields: distribution and operation planning.