Cost‐optimal truck‐and‐robot routing for last‐mile delivery

During recent years, several companies have introduced small autonomous delivery robots and evidenced their technical applicability in field studies. However, a holistic planning framework for routing utilizing these is still lacking. Current literature focuses mainly on logistical performance of using robots, ignoring real world limitations, does not assess the respective impact total costs. In contrast, this paper presents an approach to cost-optimal truck-and-robot system last-mile deliveries with time windows, showing how minimize costs tour given number available robots. Our solution algorithm based combination neighborhood search cost-specific priority rules operators truck routing, while we provide evaluate two alternatives solve robot scheduling subproblem: exact heuristic approach. We show numerical experiments that our able reduce significantly. Within case study, concept reduces by up 68% compared truck-only delivery. Finally, apply sensitivity analyses managerial guidance when can efficiently be used industry.