Order scheduling system and methodology
US7263495B2 · kind B2 · utility
Assignee
Inventor
Key dates
| Filing date | May 24, 2001 |
| Grant date | Aug 28, 2007 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Oct 1, 2023 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06Q10/06375
- WIPO fieldIT methods for management
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
An order scheduling system providing a method for distributing product orders to multiple fulfillers is described. This method, which solves the common business problem of scheduling order shipments, is optimal because it minimizes the number of orders across fulfillers, thus minimizing shipping costs. It is also fair because orders are distributed equally across fulfillers if that fulfiller has the product available. To schedule orders, a data structure is defined whose rows are represented by a hash table of Fulfillers (HF), where each column is a hash table of Products (HP) and where each index of HP is itself a bit vector (VPi). This gives a three-dimensional data structure. The method operates by performing bitwise ANDing (&) operations of the bit vectors, to generate an Order bit vector representing the optimized fulfillment (per system configuration/constraints) for a particular received order.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.