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Route Planning in Small Medium-Size Companies: An Integrated and Sustainable Approach

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Sustainable Business Management and Digital Transformation: Challenges and Opportunities in the Post-COVID Era (SymOrg 2022)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems ((LNNS,volume 562))

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Abstract

Companies operating in the sector of transportation have faced the challenge of transporting products in a high level of service and, at the same time, consider aspects related to sustainability, as the reduction of CO2, for example. In companies operating in this sector, the demand for transporting goods involves a strict control around compliance by the consumers, moreover, the need to increase quality and reduce costs when transporting goods has been one of the major concerns. Aiming to solve this challenge, logistics aspects can be considered as an important tool to support companies on developing the processes of transportation in an effective and efficient way. In this context, this research aims to understand how to bridge this gap, when analyzing the planning and management of routes in a SME in a sustainable manner, focusing on a flower company, and then to identify the problems related to distribution of products. The obtained results summarize the main problems related to distribution routes of the company, and a proposal to face those problems considering sustainable aspects was listed. For instance, solutions, such as introduction of the coordinates of all customers in the PHC software, design of new distribution zones, and a proposal to control the routes through a software with the new distribution zones for the optimization of routes. Altogether, it allowed the company to reduce the time to perform this task, as well to reduce the CO2 emission during the transportation.

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Acknowledgment

This work has been supported by national funds through FCT-Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia through project UIDB/04728/2020 (Alves) and FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia within the R&D Units Project Scope: UIDB/00319/2020 (Silva). This research was part of a Bachelor thesis of the student Diogo Costa.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto Politécnico de Viana do Castelo, Viana do Castelo, Portugal

    Diogo Costa

  2. CIICESI, Escola Superior de Tecnologia e Gestão, Politécnico do Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Wellington Alves

  3. ADiT-LAB, Instituto Politécnicode Vianado Castelo, Viana do Castelo, Portugal

    Ângela Silva

Authors
  1. Diogo Costa
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  2. Wellington Alves
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  3. Ângela Silva
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Wellington Alves .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Organizational Sciences, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia

    Marko Mihić

  2. Faculty of Organizational Sciences, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia

    Sandra Jednak

  3. Faculty of Organizational Sciences, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia

    Gordana Savić

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Costa, D., Alves, W., Silva, Â. (2023). Route Planning in Small Medium-Size Companies: An Integrated and Sustainable Approach. In: Mihić, M., Jednak, S., Savić, G. (eds) Sustainable Business Management and Digital Transformation: Challenges and Opportunities in the Post-COVID Era. SymOrg 2022. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 562. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18645-5_25

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18645-5_25

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-031-18644-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-18645-5

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