An open source Spreadsheet Solver for Vehicle Routing Problems

Abstract

The Vehicle Routing Problem (VRP) is one of the most frequently encountered optimization problems in logistics, which aims to minimize the cost of transportation operations by a fleet of vehicles operating out of a base. This paper introduces VRP Spreadsheet Solver, an open source Excel based tool for solving many variants of the Vehicle Routing Problem (VRP). Case studies of two real-world applications of the solver from the healthcare and tourism sectors that demonstrate its use are presented. The solution algorithm for the solver, and computational results on benchmark instances from the literature are provided. The solver is found to be capable of solving Capacitated VRP and Distance-Constrained VRP instances with up to 200 customers within 1 h of CPU time.