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Optimal Scheduling of a Two-stage Hybrid Flow Shop

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Abstract

We present an exact branch-and-bound algorithm for the two-stage hybrid flow shop problem with multiple identical machines in each stage. The objective is to schedule a set of jobs so as to minimize the makespan. This is the first exact procedure which has been specifically designed for this strongly \(\mathcal{NP}\)-hard problem. Among other features, our algorithm is based on the exact solution of identical parallel machine scheduling problems with heads and tails. We report the results of extensive computational experiments on instances which show that the proposed algorithm solves large-scale instances in moderate CPU time.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Combinatorial Optimization Research Group–ROI, Ecole Polytechnique de Tunisie, BP 743, 2078, La Marsa, Tunisia

    Mohamed Haouari, Lotfi Hidri & Anis Gharbi

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  1. Mohamed Haouari
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  2. Lotfi Hidri
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  3. Anis Gharbi
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Correspondence to Mohamed Haouari.

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Haouari, M., Hidri, L. & Gharbi, A. Optimal Scheduling of a Two-stage Hybrid Flow Shop. Math Meth Oper Res 64, 107–124 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00186-006-0066-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00186-006-0066-4

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