Order Crossover in Replenishment Processes of Production and Inventory Systems

Kurzfassung/Abstract

The paper considers a stochastic replenishment process that may induce order crossover, i.e., it is possible that orders arrive in a different sequence to that in which they were issued. Order crossover may occur if sequentially placed orders are processed by parallel machines or production systems respectively with independently distributed stochastic processing times. The concepts of Outstanding Orders and Effective Lead Times are introduced to model crossover situations. The applicability of both concepts is shown by analyzing two performance indicators of a periodic-review order-up-to (r,S) inventory system with independent stochastic lead times.