Joint maintenance and spare-parts inventory models: a review and discussion of practical stock-keeping rules

Abstract

Abstract Accepted by: M. Zied Babai It is natural to coordinate spare-parts inventory planning and maintenance. However, work in the former area often neglects part utilization, and work in the latter neglects the fact that effective execution of maintenance schedules is conditioned to the availability of the necessary spare parts. This paper is a call for further integration between the two areas, and to that end, we review the literature on mathematical modelling and analysis of inventory-maintenance-planning. We are not the first to address this issue (though we take a fresh perspective to the problem), but we are the first to complement such review with a discussion of simple stock keeping rules that may be used effectively in practice. We identify a growing gap between modelling and application, between theory and practice, which justifies the presentation of these simple stock keeping rules for the joint planning of inventory and maintenance. Thus, our work should be of interest not only to researchers who are looking for promising avenues for future research but also to practitioners who are seeking to improve inventory-maintenance operations.