Fast planning heuristic for batch and interactive planning

A method to reduce computational time of a computer and increase a speed of the computer processing operations, the method comprising:

• collapsing, by a planning engine stored on a computer comprising a database and a memory, a supply chain network into one or more flowpaths for at least one of the one or more end items, the one or more flowpaths comprising all end nodes from which consumption occurs, the supply chain network comprising one or more supply chain entities, the one or more supply chain entities comprising a supplier comprising one or more components, wherein the supplier provides the one or more components to a manufacturer, the manufacturer comprising one or more routings, the routings comprising one or more apparatuses configured to receive the one or more components and perform at least one operation to transform the one or more components into the one or more end items;
• storing, by the planning engine, the generated one or more flowpaths in the database;
• receiving, by the planning engine, demand for one or more end items for one or more time buckets over a computer network from at least one of the one or more supply chain entities;
• loading, by the planning engine, the one or more flowpaths in the memory of the computer only in context of the received demand;
• sorting, by the planning engine, an order of the one or more flowpaths based on one or more rules or parameters;
• generating, by the planning engine, a fact table based on the one or more flowpaths and the received demand, the fact table comprising the one of more flowpaths and one or more cells for each of the one or more flowpaths corresponding to the one or more time buckets;
• reducing, by the planning engine, the one or more flowpaths in the memory of the computer using one or more pruning techniques and constraints by removing one or more cells in the fact table when a supply or a capacity is not available, thereby reducing the computational time of the computer and increasing the speed of the computer processing operations;
• generating, by the planning engine, in response to a detected change in supply, capacity, or demand in the fact table, a supply chain plan by solving the received demand using a list based heuristic;
• communicating, by the planning engine, the generated supply chain plan over the computer network to at least one of the one or more supply chain entities;
• and
• performing, by the routings, at least one operation to transform the one or more components into the one or more end items based, at least in part, on the generated supply chain plan.

A non-transitory computer-readable medium embodied with software to reduce computational time of a computer and increase a speed of the computer processing operations, the software when executed configured to:

• collapse a supply chain network into one or more flowpaths for at least one of the one or more end items, the one or more flowpaths comprising all end nodes from which consumption occurs, the supply chain network comprising one or more supply chain entities, the one or more supply chain entities comprising a supplier comprising one or more components, wherein the supplier provides the one or more components to a manufacturer, the manufacturer comprising one or more routings, the routings comprising one or more apparatuses configured to receive the one or more components and perform at least one operation to transform the one or more components into the one or more end items;
• store the generated one or more flowpaths in the database;
• receive demand for one or more end items for one or more time buckets over a computer network from at least one of the one or more supply chain entities;
• load the one or more flowpaths in the memory of the computer only in context of the received demand;
• sort an order of the one or more flowpaths based on one or more rules or parameters;
• generate a fact table based on the one or more flowpaths and the received demand, the fact table comprising the one of more flowpaths and one or more cells for each of the one or more flowpaths corresponding to the one or more time buckets;
• reduce the one or more flowpaths in the memory of the computer using one or more pruning techniques and constraints by removing one or more cells in the fact table when a supply or a capacity is not available, thereby reducing the computational time of the computer and increasing the speed of the computer processing operations;
• store the fact table in the database;
• generate in response to a detected change in supply, capacity, or demand in the fact table, a supply chain plan by solving the received demand using a list based heuristic;
• communicate the generated supply chain plan over the computer network to at least one of the one or more supply chain entities;
• and
• perform at least one operation to transform the one or more components into the one or more end items based, at least in part, on the generated supply chain plan.