PSA Singapore Terminals Singapore
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"ILOG optimization technology has allowed us to improve operational efficiency for yard and vessel planning while taking into account available resources and operating constraints"

Chua Kee Thiam Head of Information Technology PSA Singapore Terminals

Business
PSA Singapore Terminals is the world’s largest container trans-shipment hub. It handles about one-fifth of the world's total container trans-shipment throughput, amounting to a total of 23.98 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) of containers in 2006. As an integrated facility, its four world-class terminals serve 200 shipping lines, which offer connections to 600 ports in 123 countries.

Goal
As the leading container trans-shipment hub, PSA Singapore Terminals uses innovative IT solutions as a competitive advantage to improve its operational efficiency, reduce vessel turnaround time and achieve better service levels. At PSA Singapore Terminals, vessels berth daily to discharge trans-shipment containers meant for other vessels. Upon discharge, all these containers have to be assigned temporary yard locations while waiting for their connecting vessels to arrive. These assigned locations have to satisfy a stringent set of safety and operational conditions.

Application
The assigning of yard locations is currently carried out by an intelligent yard planning system developed with ILOG CP. During loading, the orders in which containers are retrieved from the temporary yard and loaded onto the connecting vessel have a significant impact on the vessel’s turnaround time. A good loading plan can take many man-hours to generate if prepared manually. By using an intelligent ship planning module, developed using ILOG CP, the loading plan can now be produced in less than 30 minutes.

Results
PSA Singapore Terminals is recognized as an industry benchmark for its port efficiency and professionalism. Optimization technology allows it to balance customer service goals with productivity, while taking into account the company’s resources and capabilities.

ILOG Optimization has enabled PSA Singapore Terminals to utilize its port resources more efficiently. It has helped provide:

• Detailed yard location planning that meets stringent safety and stacking considerations
• Effective loading plan that ensures timely vessel turnaround
• Improved staff productivity with a higher level of automation

Technical
ILOG CP, ILOG’s suite of constraint programming software, provides the foundation for solving complex scheduling, sequencing, timetabling, routing and dispatching problems with large numbers of irregular constraints. Using logical and specialized constraints, the search algorithms find feasible solutions efficiently and allow you to improve your solutions.