Multi-type products collaborative vehicle routing problem under consideration of transshipment

Facing the increasing pressure in road transportation, small and medium-sized carriers are trying to establish horizontal coalition to reduce operational costs and improve their profitability. In this paper, the multi-type products Collaborative Vehicle Routing Problem with Transshipment (CoVRPT) is proposed. A mixed-integer linear programming model for this problem is established. The result of this problem is compared with that of multi-type products vehicle routing problem without collaboration and multi-type products CoVRP without transshipment. Numerical studies suggest that proposed method is more effective in terms of transportation cost-saving.