Performance analysis of distributed–distribution system with time window under uniform distribution of transportation time

Some companies are moving to a distributed–distribution system, in which each part of the final product is stocked separately and customer orders are fulfilled at a merge-center. Given that the transportation time is variable and the delivery time is a time window, we give two mathematical models to minimize the holding cost at the merge-center under prompt delivery. Then we discuss how to solve the models to determine the transportation lead-time. Finally we present some discussion of the models.