Presented by Alain Nguyen (Combinatorial Optimization Expert at RENAULT)
RENAULT rolled out its first OR application in supply chain in 1992, with the very first version of CPLEX. It was a central planning tool for car production.
Since then, we tackled inbound and outbound transportation, car sequencing, truck and container loading. More recently, we moved to the shop floor to deal with scheduling, line balancing, operator assignment.
Car sequencing, Capacitated VRP, line balancing: the problems we face do not exactly match the academic models. There are always extra tricky constraints and objectives.
Historically, we developed OR applications that were used on a regular basis. More recently, we rolled out tools to carry one shot quick win studies.
Important challenges remain for full OR adoption: data availability in information systems (especially shop floor constraints), non- standard processes in the plants, OR visibility inside the company, lack of facilitators between the central OR team and the field-level operators.