How to Develop a Vehicle Routing Optimization Package?

Have you ever wondered how far it will help the businesses associated with online delivery services such as meal delivery services or any online shopping services if they optimize the route? 

Do you know that optimizing their route will not only help them to choose the best route but also help them to increase their operational efficiency? 

In this blog, I will help you to know how Route Optimization will benefit your business as well as how to develop it.

Also Read: Top 5 Route Optimization Software in 2021  

Before we dive into the benefits of route optimization, let’s have a brief introduction of what route optimization is?

What is Route Optimization?

Route Optimization is all about optimizing the best route. In simple terms, it means to discover the shortest route including all necessary factors such as vehicle capacity, multiple stops, time of traveling, etc in a cost-effective way. 

Route optimization is associated with monitoring and finding out the best route for travel which is beneficial to the delivery man to deliver the parcel easily on time and also effective for the business to increase their delivery services which in turn increases the operational efficiencies. 

So, let’s get to the development process. 

How to Develop a Vehicle Routing Optimization Package?

Developing a vehicle route optimization all starts with determining the route optimization tasks. Route Optimization is a solution to vehicle routing problems. Now, what are vehicle routing problems? Vehicle routing problems are the challenges faced by the business to discover the best route for their services including all the affecting factors. 

Let’s understand the types of vehicle routing problems with the approach to its solution in brief which will help you to finalize the best software development for yourself. 

1. Capacitated Vehicle Routing Problem

This problem is associated with the vehicle’s load capacity. This problem creates a challenge to deliver more products without increasing the load capacity of the vehicle. 

Solution: The best way to solve the problem is to assign the shortest route to the vehicles to meet the maximum delivery of the product. 

2. Vehicle Routing Problem with Time Windows (VRPTW)

This problem is associated with reaching the location before time to serve the customers. Well, we all know that effective service will automatically lead to a high customer experience. 

Solution: This solution can be best optimized by minimizing the traveling cost to reach the customers in a high expected time to increase customer satisfaction. 

3. Pickup and Delivery Vehicle Routing Problem (PDVRP)

This problem is faced by the business who are engaged in simultaneous delivery service. It is concerned with destination, routing results in the pickup, and delivery points.

Solution: The problem can be solved by minimizing the total length of vehicles’ paths. It means locating more no of vehicles for service to decrease the time and distance between the order and delivery. 

Now, it’s time to solve your routing problem with the best features you would require to put on your optimization software. 

Features of Route Optimization Software 

The route optimization software is beneficial to the fleet members as well as the drivers, so while building your software you need to keep both aspects: 

For Fleet Managers

• Real-time tracking – Real-time tracking features will help the manager to assign a new task to the drivers who have completed their previous task and are free for the new ones. This helps to maintain the continuous flow of service. 
• Dynamic routing – Make sure that your software must be capable of routing in the dynamic atmosphere. This will help your managers to get adapted to the climate of the road and easily optimize the route and schedule for the deliveries. 
• AI Analytics – Integrating your app with AI analytics will help the managers to have a continuous update over the weather report and performance metric report of the drivers which will help to assemble the data at one database. 
• Vehicle condition check – The software will help the managers to detect the quality of the vehicle and give it a time to time maintenance, which will help you to schedule the roots without any hindrance. 

For Drivers 

• Easy navigation – Integrating the software with navigating to the location will help the drivers to easily reach the location on time without any hassle. The detailed information about the trip coma by the time the distance between the quote and delivery will help your driver to easily identify the shortest route and speed of the vehicle to maintain the time gap. 
• Hour of service tracking – Facilitating your software with our of service tracking for your drivers will help to optimize the number of hours your drivers want and that time the need to take a break to maintain the regulation and safety of the drivers. 
• Proof of delivery –  The software must pose a proof of delivery facility that will help the drivers to generate the document by clicking the picture or having a virtual sign by the receiver of the parcel to generalize the proof of document of their service provided to the customer. 

Now, let’s get up to developing your optimization software. 

Developing The Software: 

• Define your VRPs that need to be overcome – As mentioned above about different vehicle routing problems, you too need to identify the exact problem faced by your business to optimize the best software to eliminate that problem and move to the smoothen delivery process. 
• Bundle down your software in one place – The next step arises with the designing of your software. Compiling the needs of your managers and drivers and assembling down the software in one place will help you to build the best route optimization software.
• Integrating the software – once the software is ready, you need to pair up with your existing fleet management system and integrate it with third-party solutions to complete your software processing. 
• Refine your feedback – After pairing with the management system you need to derive the compatibility, as per the generated result if you need to replace the features or eliminate anyone you can go ahead with that. Also, your software can be upgraded from time to time for a better function. 
• Regular maintenance support – Make sure you hire custom maintenance support for regular updates to the software so that you do not face any technical issues or are obliged to any of the obstacles in your working process.

Conclusion 

Optimizing the best route cost-effectively can only be possible if it is combined with the best technology. Customizing your software with as many facilities will help you to plan the best routes with constraints and Tookan Route Optimization can help you achieve the same.