SOLVD Case Study: Severn Solutions

Severn Solutions Ltd are a digital agency that has been helping companies use technology to become more effective. As well as custom solutions, they have developed an online management platform called “TeamPoint” that helps companies manage all aspects of running a team of field-based service engineers. Teampoint builds on their years of experience working with field service operations across many sectors, providing a sophisticated system to manage the workflow issues that are commonly faced by these businesses.

Whilst the application currently has numerous corporate clients, Severn Solutions Ltd wish to expand the functionality of TeamPoint in order to win more clients. Severn Solutions Ltd sought support from the University of Wolverhampton SOLVD Project to build a new AI tool/algorithm that can create optimised schedules in order to optimise resource utilisation and minimise mileage, whilst ensuring that visits are completed within timescales in the most efficient way.

Imagine the scenario: You are a manager of a busy company of 50 engineers, working across the UK, completing over 500 tasks per month. How do you schedule all of this work in the most efficient way, when there are so many competing priorities?

An initial 12hr consultation with Severn Solutions Ltd confirmed the relevance and applicability of a heuristic-based algorithm approach to solve this large, multi-faceted scheduling problem. Our academic experts concluded that an AI solution is technically feasible, subject to further development of the algorithm, combining ‘Neighbourhood Search’ and ‘Tabu search’ functionality to solve the scheduling problem.

The finalised algorithm will ensure that:

• All tasks are completed within the allowable timeframe
• Resource utilisation is maximised
• Tasks are assigned to engineers with the appropriate skillset
• Drive time (and fuel consumption) is minimised by the effective geographical grouping of tasks

But what happens to the schedule when unplanned or emergency visits need to take priority? Given the complexity of the scheduling (i.e. a mix of planned, routine and emergency visits, resource availability, task type, and with work spread out across the UK), consideration must be given to weighting or prioritising the order in which the tasks are scheduled.

In all reality, there may not be one correct answer; we anticipate a number of different scenarios that need to be trialled in real life to understand more about which of the competing priorities needs to take precedence.

Leon Cottell, Director of Severn Solutions, commented: "Working with The University of Wolverhampton we have access to a range of resources that we do not have in house.  The University provide expertise that would otherwise be unavailable to us and enable us to research new tools and systems in a way that would be impossible on our own "  

The SOLVD project is continuing to support Severn Solutions Ltd through a longer term R&D collaboration to further refine, test and implement the recommended algorithm.

Experts from the SOLVD team at the University of Wolverhampton can help your business harness cutting-edge digital technologies to improve your business productivity.

Fully funded support is available for businesses in Shropshire, Telford & Wrekin.

For more information or to discuss your specific requirements, visit www.wlv.ac.uk/SOLVD or contact SOLVD@wlv.ac.uk.