Logistically, major distribution companies can be faced with billions of new statistics each and every month. This includes details such as customer orders, depot deliveries, postal addresses and satellite vehicle tracking.
ADVANCE (Advanced Predictive-Analysis-Based Decision-Support Engine for Logistics) is a computer-based information system being created to help collate and analyse such information to improve transport-network efficiency.
This three-year European Commission-funded project involves academic partners at the Computer and Automation Research Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Aston University and the University of Groningen.
The researchers will be working with UK-based Palletways and Technology Transfer Systems of Italy to design the ADVANCE system. It will analyse the transport requirements of all the independent haulage companies working within the logistics network to enable them to be deployed in the most efficient way. This will include reducing miles travelled and ensuring lorries are filled to capacity, rather than, as the industry terms it, ’delivering air’.
Once the trial period is complete, the analysis software will be made available for any interested companies.
Poll: Should the UK’s railways be renationalised?
I think that a network inclusive of the vehicles on it would make sense. However it remains to be seen if there is any plan for it to be for the...