D-Wave and Pattison Food Group explore driver scheduling

In 2024, D-Wave Quantum Inc., a leader in quantum computing systems and the world’s first commercial supplier of quantum computers, partnered with Pattison Food Group Ltd., a major Canadian grocery retail organisation with over 100 stores offering e-commerce delivery services. The collaboration aimed to address the complex challenge of driver scheduling for e-commerce deliveries by using D-Wave’s quantum computing technology.

The Workforce Scheduling Challenge

Pattison Food Group faced significant operational challenges with its e-commerce delivery driver scheduling process. With over 100 stores offering delivery services, the company required an efficient system to manage driver assignments across its extensive retail network.

The existing scheduling process was highly manual and labor-intensive, requiring 3-4 dedicated staff members to create driver schedules each week. These schedulers needed to account for numerous complex constraints simultaneously, including driver seniority, individual preferences, work history, and company policies. The manual nature of this process consumed substantial time and resources, was prone to human error, and often resulted in suboptimal schedules that failed to efficiently utilise the available workforce.

The scheduling problem represented a classic combinatorial optimization challenge: finding the best possible assignment of drivers to time slots and delivery routes while satisfying all constraints. The number of possible scheduling combinations grew exponentially with each additional variable, making it impossible to evaluate all possibilities manually or even with conventional computing approaches in a reasonable timeframe.

Quantum Solution

D-Wave collaborated with Pattison Food Group to develop a quantum-powered solution that could automatically generate optimised driver schedules. The solution leveraged D-Wave’s quantum annealing technology, which is specifically designed to solve complex optimization problems.

The team modelled the scheduling problem as a quadratic unconstrained binary optimization (QUBO) problem, a format suitable for D-Wave’s quantum annealing processors. This approach represented each potential driver assignment as a variable in a mathematical framework where the optimal solution minimised a cost function that accounted for all scheduling constraints.

Key features of the quantum solution included:

• Comprehensive Constraint Integration: The system incorporated all relevant scheduling rules, including driver seniority considerations, individual preferences and work history, and company policies.

• Hybrid Quantum-Classical Approach: The solution used D-Wave’s hybrid solver services, accessible through the Leap quantum cloud service, which combined the power of quantum computing with classical optimization techniques to efficiently handle the large-scale scheduling problem.

• Iterative Refinement: The system allowed for adjustments and refinements to the automatically generated schedules, providing schedulers with the flexibility to make manual modifications when necessary.

Implementation

The implementation process began with a thorough analysis of Pattison Food Group’s existing scheduling workflows and constraints. D-Wave’s team worked closely with the company’s schedulers to understand the complex rules and preferences that governed driver assignments.

Next, the partners developed a structured data model to represent all relevant scheduling information, including driver availability, qualifications, seniority levels, and store locations. This data served as input to the quantum optimization system.

The quantum scheduling application was deployed as a cloud-based solution, allowing Pattison’s scheduling team to access it through D-Wave’s Leap quantum cloud service. This approach eliminated the need for on-premises quantum hardware while providing secure, reliable access to D-Wave’s quantum computing resources.

The implementation included a training phase for Pattison’s scheduling team, ensuring they could effectively use the new system and interpret its results. The partners also established a feedback loop to continuously improve the solution based on real-world performance and user experiences.

Results and Business Impact

The implementation of D-Wave’s quantum-powered scheduling solution delivered significant and measurable business benefits for Pattison Food Group. Most notably, the company achieved an approximately 80% reduction in the manual effort required for initial schedule creation.

This dramatic efficiency improvement translated into multiple operational benefits:

• Resource Reallocation: Staff members previously dedicated to manual scheduling could now be redirected to higher-value activities, improving overall operational efficiency.

• Schedule Quality: The quantum-optimised schedules better aligned with driver preferences and company policies, potentially leading to increased driver satisfaction and reduced turnover.

• Responsiveness: The rapid generation of optimised schedules enhanced the company’s ability to respond to changing delivery demands and driver availability.

The success of this implementation demonstrated the practical business value of quantum computing in addressing real-world operational challenges. Instead of remaining a theoretical technology with future potential, D-Wave’s quantum solution delivered immediate, measurable benefits in a production environment.

Future Directions

Following the successful implementation of the driver scheduling solution, Pattison Food Group and D-Wave identified opportunities to extend the application of quantum computing to other aspects of the retail operation. Potential areas for future optimization included inventory management, store staffing, and supply chain logistics.

The partners also recognised opportunities to enhance the existing scheduling solution by incorporating additional data sources, such as traffic patterns and weather forecasts, to further improve delivery efficiency. By continually refining the optimization model and incorporating more variables, the quantum solution could deliver even greater business value over time.

D-Wave has showcased the Pattison Food Group case study as an example of quantum computing’s practical business applications, highlighting it alongside other successful implementations such as Ford Otosan’s manufacturing production scheduling (which achieved an 83% time reduction) and NTT Docomo’s mobile network resource utilisation (which saw a 15% improvement). These success stories collectively demonstrate that quantum computing has transitioned from a theoretical technology to one that delivers practical business value across diverse industries and use cases.