An Integer Programming Model for the Capacitated Vehicle Routing Problem with Drones

The Capacitated Vehicle Routing Problem with Drones (CVRPD) is caused by the increasing interest in commercial drone delivery by many logistic companies (Amazon, DHL, etc.). Our proposition is a binary integer linear programming (BILP) model with objective function which minimizes the distance covered by drones. In our model, we consider the parcel delivery by a truck that transports/has a certain number of drones. Each drone can take off from the truck and deliver a parcel to the customer. It can also pick up a parcel from the customer. Drones have a specific range and payload. We assume that for each delivery area there are several points - so-called mobile distribution centers - where a drone can be launched/retrieved from the truck. The question that arises for such a problem is the selection of drone launch/retrieval locations to minimize the cost of delivery. The paper presents also the implementation of the model in the mathematical programming environment. An author's own iterative algorithm using mathematical programming methods was proposed to solve the problem.