UPS has announced an early rollout of ORION, On-Road Integrated Optimization and Navigation, its route optimization software that was first prototyped in 2008. The advanced software merges map data with customer delivery requests to provide optimized driving instructions that reduce the number of miles driven while still meeting service and shipping requirements.
As soon as the driver departs the UPS facility, ORION begins to asses routing options continuously to provide the best possible choice for the driver even as customers change their delivery preferences. At its full potential, ORION will be executing tens of thousands optimizations every minute.
The shipping giant projects and annual savings of as much as $50 million if the route optimizing software can cut just one mile per driver per day. By the close of 2013, UPS projects more than 1.5 million gallons of fuel saved and a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 14,000 metric tonnes.
UPS will utilize ORION on almost all 55,000 routes in the U.S. by 2017 with plans for global implementation in the future.