The Race Against the Clock: Optimizing Supply Chain Capacity for Faster Deliveries — Part 1 (Capacity Management Series)

Flipkart's engineering team explains how their Promise Engine calculates delivery dates and why gaps exist between theoretical and actual delivery speeds. The core problem is 'spillage' — orders missing warehouse processing waves and truck connections due to capacity constraints. Four operational levers are introduced to reduce spillage: optimal capacity determination across assets, synchronized wave cut-off design aligned with truck schedules, truck departure-aware order assignment (replacing naive FIFO), and cohort prioritization during demand surges like Big Billion Days. The post is part one of a series, with the next installment focusing on the mathematical optimization behind wave cut-off design.